Dog Tethering Law: Fairfax City Council Makes Decision

Correction, Jan. 17 5:46 p.m.: Councilmembers Ellie Schmidt and Jeff Greenfield were present during the work session on this issue.

Fairfax City resident Tim Parmly says, even though the Council decided not to move forward with stricter laws on dog tethering in the city Tuesday night, he will not give up fighting for more humane treatment of dogs.

Parmly said the treatment of his neighbors' dog concerned him so much that he approached the City Council last year and asked them to consider the idea of prohibiting tethering dogs in the city.

The Treatment That Concerned Him

He explained that his neighbors came home from spending the holidays out of town about a year ago with a brand-new, 8-week-old puppy that the wife of the family didn't want, but that her husband and four kids did.

At first, Parmly said they approached him—knowing that he is a licensed veterinary technician—and asked his advice on how to care for their new dog and get it acclimated to its new home.

However, it quickly became apparent to Parmly that they didn't want the dog in the house, he said.

Parmly said the dog's very first night in the home, the family chained it up in the backyard. During the night, a thunderstorm broke out and the dog howled and howled to be let in, but no one came. Finally, he said he went over into their yard and took the dog into his own home for the rest of the night.

That became the new norm, Parmly said. The family appeared not to want the dog in the house at all, and therefore would leave it chained up in the backyard for 10 to 12 hours at a time, every day. 

"They would just go off and leave it, with the expectations that if it started pouring down rain, I would bring it inside," he said.

Finally, one summer day, in intense heat last year, Parmly said he grew very concerned when the dog seemed overheated and its water bowl hadn't been refilled in a while.

"It seemed I just wasn't getting through to them, so I decided to call Animal Control and filed a complaint," he said. "I thought the dog deserved better than that."

However, proving his case was the problem, it seemed.

Reportedly, Animal Control made visits to the house, but after observing plenty of water available, space for the dog to move around freely on its tether, and the shelter of a doghouse in the yard, the officer observed no violation of the law, and after speaking with the family, said it appeared they loved their dog very much.

Parmly said even though he was the one who filed the complaint, the Animal Control officer never spoke to him, so he didn't have the chance to tell them about incidents like the night of the thunderstorm or the summer day when the dog's water wasn't refilled.

It became clear to Parmly that nothing was going to be done, so he said he even offered to pay the family $500 to sell him the dog so he could better care for it, but he said the family was angry at him for filing the complaints and therefore wanted nothing more to do with him.

City Council, Chief of Police Mull Over 'Philosophical Concern' of Dog Tethering

During a work session Tuesday night, Mayor Scott Silverthorne, the City Council and Chief of Police Rick Rappoport discussed the pros and cons of dog tethering and whether they should prohibit or adopt a stricter law regarding the practice.

Rappoport made a presentation in which he detailed the total of 12 complaints in all that have been filed with the City over the two-year period of 2012 and 2013.

Currently, the City of Fairfax's law mirrors the state's law, which mandates:

• Sufficient space to allow the dog to stand, sit, lie, turn about, in a comfortable, normal position for the animal.

• The tether is attached by a properly-applied collar to protect the animal from injury and prevent entanglement. 

• The tether must not extend over an object or edge that could result in strangulation or injury.

• The tether is at least three-times the length of the animal.

The City has the freedom to make the law stricter than the state's law if it chooses.

Rappoport also detailed every other jurisdiction in Virginia that has adopted stricter standards than the state's.

Many of the stricter standards consisted of a time restriction, which varied from allowing tethering for only one hour, as it is in Richmond, to three or four hours, such as in Alexandria, all the way up to 12 hours in Fauquier and Northampton.

Other jurisdictions such as Staunton mandate the dog must be older than 4 months old to be tethered, and Danville says tethering is not allowed when the temperature is less than 32 degrees.

"I would venture to say that when you look at some of those things, there’s probably a dog’s name and a very sad story attached to every one of those laws," Rappoport said to the Council. "You don’t get that kind of specificity without some sort of public tragedy. And they’re all different tragedies."

Rappoport also said it was his impression that many of those jurisdictions have had problems with illegal dog fighting in the past, which may explain the motivation for the stricter laws.

All in all, the Chief said the City receives far more complaints about untethered dogs than of improperly tethered dogs.

"In general, we [at the police department] believe it’s better to educate pet owners and seek voluntary compliance with the law, in particular because many people don’t know there are technical requirements," he added, such as the length a tether must be, and so forth.