KC DOG BLOG

Dangerous Dog Laws that Work

In 2007, in the shadow of a tragic fatal dog attack (involving a young boy that was mauled by a female dog that was chained up in the family's basement with her litter of puppies) in Minneapolis, the city began looking at making changes that would improve public safety in the community.

Their law, which you can find in its entirety here (64:110), sets up two different criteria of dogs based on the bahavior of the dogs. "Potentially dangerous" dags are ones that, while unprovoked, inflict a minor injury on a person or domestic animal or a "known propensity, tendency or disposition to attack unprovoked". Danerous" animals are ones that inflict fairly substantial wounds.

The law also prohibits dogs that are declared dangerous (based on behavior) from being owned by violent folons.

I've discussed the ordinance before, but new numbers make talking about it worth repeating.

In 2005, Minneapolis has 481 total bites in the city.  In 2007, Minneapolis had 411 total bites. In 2008, the first full year with the ordinance, numbers dropped to 360 total bites.  In 2009 they had "just over 300". 

The number of "serious" (defined by the bite breaking the skin) dog bites dropped 19% in 2008 and another 35% in 2009 - from 140 "serious" bites in 2007, to 113 in 2008, and 74 in 2009.

It isn't uncommon after a significant dog attack for cities to re-look at their dangerous dog laws. All too often they seem to focus on "what other cities have done" vs what has actually been effective at solving the problem. There is also a tendency to do something knee jerk (like a breed ban) that is based on what they think the public wants vs doing the research necessary to figure out what will actually solve the problem.

Repeatedly, laws that target chronically irresponsible pet owners and define dangerous dogs based solely on the behavior of the dog have proven to be effective an minimizing dog bites in communities. We need to learn from these successes and promote similar legislation and enforcement techniques that actually WORK for the betterment of animals and the community.

Modeling ordinances that work

It happens quite a bit. There is a dog bite in a community. People start saying "something needs to be done" to prevent this from happening again. Cities talk about what to do. Someone mentions banning breeds. Talk circles and people begin taking sides. 

The reality is that we're all on the same side on this. People want to feel safe. Even when they say they want to ban a breed, what they are really saying is, I want to be safe -- they just may not have enough information to determine that what they say they want, is the solution to what they really want.  Which is why it is imperative that city leaders work really hard to not only model ordinances that have been done in other communities -- but to model ordinances that actually have WORKED to improve public safety.

Minneapolis and St. Paul, MN faced this situation two years ago.  At the time, 7 year old Zachary King, Jr. was killed by a 'pit bull' that was chained up in the basement of the family's home. After much debate, both cities decided against breed specific legislation -- and opted to go toward a breed neutral approach that focused on dog owners, not dog breeds.

I'm going to focus a bit more on the Minneapolis law here because I can find the exact wording (64.110) online, but I believe that both city's laws are essentially similar.  In Minneapolis, they focused on creating two designations for "aggressive" dogs -- "Dangerous" and "Potentially Dangerous". 

"Potentially Dangerous" dogs are dogs that, while unprovoked, inflict some type of minor injury on a person or domestic animal, or has a "known propensity, tendency or disposition to attack unprovoked."

"Dangerous" dogs are ones that have inflicted fairly substantial wounds.

Each designation comes with its own set of criteria for keeping the dog.

I like this ordinance for several reasons:

1) It does allow concerned neighbors to call about dogs they feel are aggressive even before a bite has occurred -- providing a preventative measure of animal control  instead of an entirely reactive one. However, the restrictions are very doable for the average dog owner if their dog is declared "potentially dangerous" even before a bite. And as their own test has shown, 'dangerous' dogs can come in a variety of breeds, with 9 different breeds being represented among the 11 dogs declared 'dangerous' under the law. (Editor's note: their listing only has 8 different breeds listed, but I completely think they failed the breed ID on the "Black German Shepherd" so I made it 9). There are 96 different breeds of dogs between the two cities that have made the 'potentially dangerous" list -- with the most popular breeds being the ones with the most listed.

2) It allows protection for the dog owner because it has a built-in appeals process -- so that no one can become a victim of a vindictive neighbor and have their dog declared "potentially dangerous" unjustly.

3) It allows for an annual appeal process -- so owners that have a dog declared potentially dangerous can go through training classes, get their dog over its hurdles, and get the potentially dangerous designation lifted -- thus rewarding the type of behavior we want in dog owners.

*Olathe, KS has a similarly worded ordinance that they enacted in 2005 and is one that we promote a lot here locally.

Minneapolis also added a law that prohibited dogs that were declared dangerous (based on behavior) from being owned at all by violent felons or by people who violated the restrictions put on the dogs.

St. Paul also passed an additional ordinance that stated that if someone had a dog removed twice within a five year period they would no longer be allowed to own dogs. This "three strikes and you're out" principle (although it's two here) is something we've pushed for here in Kansas City as it would allow them to deal with folks like someone who has had 18 dogs removed from his property in the past 6 years because of cruelty and they just continue repeating the cycle with the owner

 So how have the results been? In 2008, the first full year under the ordinance, Minneapolis saw bites decline by 12%, from 411 in 2007 to 360 in 2008. While exact numbers weren't given in St. Paul, their head of animal control says their bite numbers are also falling.

Compare this to cities like San Francisco, or Council Bluffs, or Aurora, CO, who went with breed specific regulations and all saw an increase in dog bites following the passing of the law.

So when we look at providing what we all want -- public safety -- it is imperative that we, as communities, look to cities that have ordinances that are actually proving to be affective at delivering public safety.  Fortunately, more and more cities are taking this smarter, more effective, breed neutral approach. With these policies, animal control officers are able to focus on problem dogs and dog owners, regardless of breed, and ONLY those dogs that are posing problems -- instead of wasting time focusing on dogs of a targeted breed that are causing no problems whatsoever and with no tools to focus on problem dogs of non-targeted breeds.

It only makes sense.

The entire story from the Minneapolis Star-Tribune on their ordinances can be found here.