Sheriff Will Seek Funding
For Dog-Control Activities
All Interested Parties Gather, Discuss At ‘Summit’
By JIM KEVLIN • for www.AllOTSEGO.com
HARTWICK SEMINARY – County Sheriff Richard J. Devlin Jr. told a summit of parties involved in developing, enforcing the paying for dog-control laws – from state Sen. Jim Seward, R-Milford, to town “DCOs” – that he will ask the county board to put money in his 2017 budget to fill a gap that has been bedeviling the process this year.
“We need you; you need us,” Devlin told the gathering under a tent at Council Rock Brewery after a tour of the Susquehanna Animal Shelter a hundred yards to the south. “We just need to figure out a way to fund it.”
At issue is implementation of Article 7 and Article 26 of the state Ag & Markets Law.
Article 7 requires DCOs – town dog enforcement officers – to seize roaming dogs, and the towns of pay for it.
Article 26 requires law-enforcement agencies to seize animals that have been maltreated, but the district attorney must then go after the pet owner to pay the cost of caring for the seized animals; often, the pet owners can’t afford to pay, or they would have cared for their pets properly in the first place.
The case in point happened in March, when a half-dozen dogs seized in a Laurens cruelty case were dropped off at the animal shelter here by deputies, who had no access to funds to pay for the care. The bill eventually ran up to $6,000, and the county board has been debating if paying the cost would leave them with an open-ended liability.
County Rep. Len Carson, R-Oneonta, who chairs the Public Safety & Legal Affairs Committee, attended this evening’s session and expressed support for action to resolve the matter, although what specific action is still to be worked out.
Senator Seward said, if adjustments are needed in the Ag & Markets law, he would be at the ready to champion them.
Animal Shelter Executive Director Stacie Haynes expressed satisfaction with the summit – the exchange of views went on for a hour; in particular, that county reps, the sheriffs, a state police representative, DCOs and shelter officials were in conversation together for the first time.
“My hope is we can all come together for the good of the animals,” said Trish Riddell Kent, the Oneonta Town Board member who is also on the Animal Shelter Board.
Animal Shelter Board President Gaylord Dillingham added that there needs to be “a countywide understood policy” on “whose going to come for them and whose going to pay for it.”
“There’s been a lot of buck-passing,” he said, “between the towns and us.”
Have Senator Seward sponsor a bill to reform the Ag and Markets Law, that currently takes most of the dog licensing money collected by towns for the state. Leave all of the money with the towns, and allow the towns to set fees for licensing. Perhaps increasing the fees appreciably, wood defer some who can’t afford to feed their pets from owning them…sounds harsh but so is animal cruelty!!
No one ,to my knowledge, has been willing to fund a position of a Qualified Animal Cruelty Investigator and the county has not had a designated one since the position was done away with a number of years ago. The last one I worked with when I was a D.C.O. was Marvin Mulford.He worked out of the S.P.C.A. facility in Hyde Park. Correct me if I am mistaken, please, but after Marvin’s position was done away with the responsibility was thrown at the Otsego County Sheriff and the New York State Troopers. Whether any of their personnel ever went to Animal Control Academy or not I do not know. I would have to assume so. That said this county, in my opinion, needs a designated qualified and trained Cruelty Investigator. The Police have enough on their hands without having to deal with the N.Y.S. Ag. and Mkts. Laws. About time some agency coughed up the funds to pay for it once and for all.