Dog Licenses Thing of the Past in Golden Valley

Move over rotary-dial telephone. Move over black and white televisions. Move over carbon copy paper.

Make room for dog licenses in Golden Valley in the now-obsolete category.

Tuesday night at , the Golden Valley City Council voted 3 to 2 to no longer require annual dog licenses for the more than one thousand estimated pooches who live within city residents.

Police Chief Stacy Carlson had proposed eliminating the licenses about a year ago, arguing the amount of staff time and other administrative tasks made the requirement financially prohibitive.

She said the six-dollar annual fee didn’t cover those costs. On top of that, she said she believes there is a compliance issue. Fewer than half of the estimated dogs in the city get an annual license.

What was initially expected to be a relatively smooth change became a much-talked about issue with dog owners.  that by getting rid of licensing in Golden Valley, they'd have to pay a much higher price for a license in another city, like Minneapolis, if they wanted to use the dog parks there.  There are currently no dog parks in Golden Valley.

Then, in March, the council asked City Manager Tom Burt to come back in April with revisions to the ordinance on dogs and to red line the matter of licenses. 

"Administratively, it is not practical to require licenses because the costs to the program are greater than the fees taken in,” said council member Paula Pentel “I have heard from a fair number of residents asking we discontinue the licensing requirement.”

Still, the city looked at whether keeping the licensing would work, and in the end, the reccommendation of the city manager and the police chief was that the program should be scrapped.

The one exception under the new provision is that dangerous dogs will be required to be licensed.

One of the council members who voted against the proposed change on Tuesday night was the newly re-elected Mike Freiberg, who is also a public health professional.

“Dog licenses are the main way the city maintains requirements for vaccinations, especially rabies,” he said. “Having a license and being required to have proof of up-to-date rabies vaccinations to get a license, helps in that requirement.

Joanne Paul, crime analyst with the police department, says if a dog owner is cited for having a dog off leash, for example, that owner must provide proof of a rabies vaccination or they will be warned or even fined.

Freiberg also addressed some of the other comments that had been made in the last year supporting getting rid of licensing.

“I realize there is an arguments that with so many dogs having micro chips, that the process of identifying stray or lost dogs and notifying the owners is a lot easier," he said. "However I still think it is worth it to control the health risk. Several public health officials I spoke with on the matter concur with my position.”

Freiberg also said that there are other ordinances on the books that the city has to fund because fees don’t cover the costs.

The old ordinance will become null and void on Nov. 25, the day after the change is put into effect.