Hart BOC Gets First Look at Proposed Animal Control Ordinance

Hart County Commissioners are planning a work session later this month to review a proposed new animal control ordinance.

If approved, this would be the first time in the County’s 160 years that any laws regarding stray or unwanted animals is on the books.

At their regular meeting Tuesday, county administrator Jon Caime presented the board with a draft of the new ordinance, which outlines, among other things, the definition of a stray dog, and the duties of an animal control officer.

Caime said he based the proposed ordinance on the one Madison County uses.  Whether to have animal control in the county has been a hotbed issue for several years in Hart County.

The problem according to Caime, is that the is issue has become too big to handle all at once and the Board of Commissioners feels overwhelmed.

“Every time this subject has been brought up over the past eight years, they get overwhelmed with all the different components. It just seems to them that there’s too much to be done so they just table it,” Caime said.

But more recently, he said, the board has realized that something must be done in order to be in compliance with state law that requires every county and municipality in Georgia to have some sort of animal control.

Caime said he’s been in talks with the Hart County Sheriff and the Hartwell City manager about animal control and hiring an animal control officer.

He said from those talks, he’s recognized three main areas that need to be addressed immediately by the county.

The first he said is the problem of people dumping unwanted dogs and puppies, cats and kittens.

“There should be no tolerance for the dumping of animals,” he said. “That just compounds the problem because those puppies grow up to be wild dogs and they mate and have more puppies and now you’ve got dozens of stray and feral dogs running loose in the county.”

The second issue is identifying which animals are truly strays and which are not.  Caime said if passed by the board, the county will require all dog owners to put a collar with a name tag on their pet.

“You can get these (tags) at Wal-mart and Petsmart.  It will have the owner’s name and phone number on it. That way, the Sheriff can identify which animals belong to someone and which are strays. Then if he finds an dog that doesn’t have a proper name tag on it, it will be considered an abandoned or  stray animal and he can do something legally in that regard,” Caime said.

As for an animal control officer, Caime said the county will likely hire a part-time person who will work only when the Northeast Georgia Animal Shelter in Lavonia is open so animals can be taken directly there. The shelter contracts with the county for the intake of stray and unwanted dogs and cats.

That, he said, would eliminate the need for the county to build any sort of after hours holding facility.

“I do belive it’s going to be a good thing,” said Shelter Director Sheri Lockhart. “This is a step in the right direction. I can see it being a wonderful thing for the county to help get the strays off the street that nobody is taking responsibility for.”

Hart County commissioners plan to meet for a work session at 4p, May 28^th before their regular meeting  to discuss the proposed animal control ordinance.