Reading, PA: Court won’t hear Reading’s appeal over rejected dog law

Court won’t hear Reading’s appeal over rejected dog law

By Don Spatz
Reading Eagle
1/24/2009

Reading, PA – The state Supreme Court has […]refused to hear the city’s appeal of an earlier ruling that threw out Reading’s 10-year-old aggressive breed ordinance, effectively killing the ordinance.

The measure had imposed severe restrictions on dog breeds that bit too many people – an action not taken since 2003. In February, the Commonwealth Court ruled it violated state law banning municipalities from prohibiting or otherwise limiting a specific breed of dog.[…]

•Contact reporter Don Spatz at 610-371-5027 or dspatz@readingeagle.com.

The stricken ordinance

The courts have thrown out Reading’s 10-year-old aggressive dog breed ordinance. Whenever a breed was deemed responsible for too many bites in a given year, the ordinance put these rules into effect for breed owners the following year:

•Owners had to get a $500 permit to keep a non-neutered male of the breed.

•Owners had to post signs at their homes alerting neighbors of their dogs’ presence and erect tall fences to keep their dogs from leaving their yards.

•When in public, their dogs had to be muzzled and kept on short chain leashes.

Full article retrieved 1/24/09 from http://www.readingeagle.com/article.aspx?id=122661