Registrations ‘positive’ sign; Quebec ready to table bill
Owners have until June 1 to ensure they are sterilized, microchipped, vaccinated
Close to 2,000 pit bull-type dogs were registered with the city of Montreal prior to the March 31 deadline, in accordance with the pit bull ban voted in by city council in late September.
Under the law, the city has the right to seize any pit-bull type dogs that have not been registered and have them euthanized or removed from the municipality. To date, no unregistered dogs have been seized.
Owners of dogs that have been registered, at a cost of $150, have until June 1 to ensure they’re sterilized, microchipped and vaccinated for rabies. The dogs must be muzzled when outside their homes.
The city instituted the ban and stricter pet regulations following a fatal attack on 55-year-old woman in her back yard last June, arguing that statistics show pit-bull type dogs are responsible for an inordinately high percentage of attacks in Montreal. Although existing pit bulls are allowed to remain, no new dogs of that type can be acquired, in an effort to phase out the breed in the city.
City officials said the number of pit bull-type dogs registered exceeded their most recent estimate that there were 1,400 of those types of dogs on its territory.
“The numbers are positive, in that they show people are sensitized to the importance of having their dogs registered,” city spokesperson Geneviève Dubé said.
City estimates of its overall dog population and of how many are of the pit bull variety have fluctuated broadly over the last few months, however.
In the fall of 2016, when the city was preparing to vote in the new law, officials said there were roughly 145,000 dogs in the city, of which 4.6 per cent were pit bull types, putting the total number of those dogs at 6,700. The city also said only 20 per cent of all dogs were registered, roughly 30,000.
In January, the city revised its estimate of the number of dogs in the city to 100,000, a 33 per cent drop. It bases its estimate partly by statistics supplied by animal rescue centres, Dubé said, but she could not explain the reasons for the drop.
About 40,000 dogs are now registered, which puts the overall percentage of licensed dogs at 40 per cent, under the latest dog population estimates.
Owners of unregistered dogs of any breed face fines of $300 to $700.
The city has six to seven animal patrol officers checking the city’s 19 boroughs for violations, a number that is to be bolstered for the summer months, Dubé said. Some boroughs have inspectors of their own, who typically work two to three days a week.
Although the city’s animal patrollers have the authority to seize an unregistered pit bull-type dog, and city officials say they have received the training to identify them, Dubé said they would resort to that measure only as a last resort. Veterinarians and animal rescue centres critical of the ban have argued it’s almost impossible to positively identify a pit bull-type dog by sight. Dubé could not say what would happen in the event an owner disputed a dog patroller’s finding that a dog was part pit bull.
The Montreal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals announced in March it had relented on its vow to to no longer accept dogs into their shelters because they feared the new law would oblige them to euthanize behaviourally sound animals. It will extend its contracts with boroughs, and take in animals, but will not be taking any dogs seized by the city, or euthanizing seized dogs “simply because of the way they look.”
The SPCA is also pursuing its legal battle against aspects of the bylaw that target dogs based on their appearance.
The Quebec government will table legislation Thursday to regulate dangerous dogs.