Dog kennel bylaws have ‘flaws’

By Colleen Dane
Record Staff
Oct 20 2006

Dog training classes run by the Forbidden Plateau Obedience and Tracking Club were cancelled Wednesday night so members of the group could attend a public hearing on proposed amendments to the regional district’s dog kennel bylaws.

“There’s a lot of things in this law that are just plain flawed,” kicked off Courtenay club member Angela Gilbert. “You guys need to go back to the drawing board.”

About 40 people attended the hearing this week designed for the board to hear feedback on the proposed bylaw amendments.

It was launched by a brief explanation from general manager of community planning for the Comox Strathcona Regional District Carlos Felip of the main changes being outlined for the bylaw — namely the suggestion to limit zoning where dog kennels are allowed and to remove the requirement for “for profit” status to be a kennel.

The changes together would effectively mean that any person with four or more dogs on their property would be deemed a kennel, and if their property doesn’t meet the new size requirements, would become legal non-conforming and grandfathered in.

“We are trying to control the impact of kennels, which of course, noise is a factor,” said Felip.

He said that noise bylaws have been unenforceable, and these changes would make the regional district able to address complaints.

That worried members of the audience that well-behaved family dogs could be targeted because of numbers, and not because of behaviour.

“I would like to say that one dog can be as much a problem as four,” said Pauline Law — arguing that two misbehaved dogs can be far more disruptive than four to 10 well-trained ones.

For some people in the room that have struggled with problem owners the issue was a different one.

“I believe in this bylaw because I really and truly think that for a residential owner there should be responsibility put on the residents,” said Ken Giles.

He added that it would give them more ability to stop irresponsible owners, while and keep neighbourhoods clean and quiet.

Members of the dog club and its supporters though, that mostly packed the room, said that the new bylaw wouldn’t address irresponsible owners — stating that instead the law-abiding owners who are cognizent of the impacts of their dogs on neighbourhoods would feel unreasonably regulated.

Directors and staff’s comments that their bylaws are only enforceable by complaint (implying that well-behaved dogs and responsible owners most likely needn’t worry) didn’t appease owners either.

“If we have good neighbours and we’re good neighbours then we’ll be fine — but we all know there are weirdos in this country and there are weirdos in this Valley,” said another women.

While the dog owners were stressed by the proposal, there were still people in the audience who felt it would make a positive difference for them.

“We do have a problem in my neighbourhood and it’s something we very seriously need to address,” said Dennis Garnier.

Club members agreed there are problems but argued that instead of making these changes, more teeth should be put in the regional district’s animal control bylaw.

“Obviously, people who wrote this really didn’t look at it from the view of responsible owners,” said Margot Jorgenson.

Following the public hearing, board members cannot receive any additional information. They will review the written submitted comments and consider the speaker’s arguments before presenting a recommendation at an upcoming board meeting.

reporter@comoxvalleyrecord.com