March 4, 2022
Photo courtesy: NMDOG
On the evening of Wednesday, March 2, 2022, to a standing-room-only crowd, the Valencia County Board of Commissioners heard and voted on an animal control ordinance revision proposal that will greatly improve the daily lives of the community’s animals. Animal Protection Voters was honored to play a role in developing and supporting the proposed ordinance, which passed after compelling testimony by many of the Commission meeting attendees about how it would positively affect the region’s animals and those who care about them.
The ordinance changes include:
- A ban on chaining / tethering of unattended animals: unattended animals must be kept untethered in a secure enclosure—preventing the many negative effects and dangers of tethering with an enforcement emphasis on education and time for residents to comply
- Stronger outdoor shelter requirements: animals kept outdoors must be in an enclosure consisting of four sides, a roof, an entryway, a floor, suitable insulation, of appropriate dimensions for the breed and size of the animals, and structurally sound and leak-proof
- Suitable bedding for animals will be required below 45 degrees, except in heated shelters
- Microchipping requirement for animals: this will make identification and return of stray animals more efficient while putting more accountability on guardians to spay/neuter and safely contain their animals
- Increased fees for adoption and licensing of intact animals, and a sterilization requirement for stray animals upon a third intake: this will help reduce unwanted puppy and kitten litters and defray animal control and sheltering costs
We give special thanks to Valencia County Animal Control Director Jess Weston for his leadership in crafting the ordinance revision and bringing it before the Valencia County Board of Commissioners. Over his years of service, Jess has proven himself to be a true champion of animals. The newly adopted ordinance went into effect the moment it was voted in, and the new fee schedule had already been passed at a recent meeting of the Commission.
To ease the process of public compliance, a period of delayed enforcement and public education will allow the communities of Valencia County time to understand the ordinance revision and adapt to the changes. Valencia County Animal Control plans to begin enforcement of the unattended tethering ban at the end of 2022. In addition, financial assistance has been raised to facilitate compliance: APV’s affiliated 501(c)(3) Animal Protection New Mexico has pledged $3,000 in seed funding for fencing or kennels to help low- and fixed-income Valencia County residents get their dogs off chains and tethers. Another nonprofit organization, NMDOG, has offered to match that, and a local resident has generously offered her own funds, making $7000 already available for this purpose. There appears to be additional fundraising taking place as well, which will help Valencia County families who are ready to unchain their dogs but may struggle to afford an alternative safe and humane enclosure.
When the original Valencia County animal control ordinance was enacted in 1997, chaining or tethering dogs was sadly the norm in New Mexico. Since then, we have been heartened to see that a growing number of New Mexico’s municipalities and counties—including the City of Las Cruces and Doña Ana County, the City of Santa Fe and Santa Fe County, and the City of Albuquerque and Bernalillo County—have become aware of the animal welfare and public safety dangers of this inhumane practice and have prohibited tethering.
Animal Protection Voters worked in 2007 to develop and support House Memorial 19, which requested that the New Mexico Department of Public Safety undertake a study to investigate the serious public safety and humane implications of persistently chaining dogs. The report from that study—which detailed a review of the practice of chaining, its effect on dogs, resultant human deaths and injuries, state and national trends in tethering laws, and more—was published in 2008 and can be found here.
Thanks to the boldly compassionate action of supporters like you, Valencia County is now one of many localities across New Mexico that have acted to phase out the inhumane and dangerous practice of dog chaining—and our team is thrilled to work with anyone across the state who wants to take this positive change to their own backyards.
