First you posted this:

"If you'll tell me what town you live in, I'll try to look up the local ordinance for you."


Then this:

"Oh, my bad! You posted animal ordinances for Dekalb County, so I made the assumption that the ordinances you posted were actually relevant to your discussion of your own experiences. It seemed like a reasonable assumption at the time. (shrug) "


I think you are so caught up in arguing that you are forgetting what you have asked. I posted the ordinance for Dekalb, where I live, because that was at one point relevant to your discussion. So yes, my good, your bad.

Keep in mind that when reading the regulations they were written for code enforcement, not for rescue work. Much of the insight I have also comes from seeing cases play out in court. Issues of private property are very touchy once lawyers get involved.

"In practice, of course, AC has virtually NO desire to take these animals to the shelter, as long as the person who found them is willing to take responsibility for them"

So, one more time I will address your statement. With regards to stray dogs and my experience;

1) They are considered to be private property, much like an illegally parked vehicle, you can not take one home with you just because of a minor code violation if you are not the owner.

2) If AC is notified, or sees a violation, they have a duty to respond in order to enforce code, i.e. dog running at large, a duty to protect the stray animal and to protect the public from the stray. The media would be all over us if the stray dog attacked someone after we had contact with the animal and failed to either return it home or seize it. Not every AC Officer discharges his duty to standard, but that does not negate the fact that the primary mission of AC is to enforce code and catch stray dogs. That is why we are called "dog catchers", we make our living by catching stray dogs so that we can bring them to the shelter.

3) Because stray dogs are considered to be someone's private property we can not give them to you until after we establish that the owner no longer has a claim to his property. Once that is done, and your state may have some variation on the process, then new ownership can be established via what ever process the county dictates.


I hope this provides some meaningful insight to you and hopefully it will be helpful to your rescue work.

"In fact I tried to call DeKalb County animal control"

With regards to where I use to work, no you can not have that information. You are well outside the circle of trust. In fact, this thread is really starting to get stupid.

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