Columbia looks to curb dog tethering, puppy trunk-sales with new animal rules
Columbia may soon tighten rules on how long dogs can be tethered outdoors and where animals can be sold, part of a broader overhaul of the city’s animal control ordinance.
The city’s current ordinance leaves major gaps, including around tethering and other animal care standards, and doesn’t address a recurring complaint: puppies and other pets being sold from trunks in parking lots and roadside corners.
Columbia’s animal rules are long-overdue for updates to better define humane pet-care standards and close enforcement gaps, officials said.
The proposed changes were presented Feb. 24 to Columbia City Council’s Health, Social and Environmental Affairs Committee by Animal Services staff. The new rules are just a draft at this stage.
New tethering rules and animal care standards proposed
One of the biggest proposed changes would cut the amount of time dog owners are allowed to tether their pets outdoors from 9 hours to 2 hours in a 24-hour period.
“This is a change that is very dear to us,” Columbia Animal Services Director Victoria Riles told the council committee this week. The existing 9-hour tethering limit is difficult to enforce because animal services staff can’t spend 9 hours monitoring one animal, she added.
“We do currently address tethering, but it is very vague,” Riles said.
The city frequently hears from residents reporting that their neighbor has left their dog tied outside “oftentimes (for) 24 hours,” Riles said.
The new rules, if approved, would limit the legal timeframe to two hours, and it would also add specific requirements to keep tethered dogs safer. That includes age restrictions and special rules for severe weather. Riles and her team landed on the 2-hour tethering limit by looking at what other municipalities have done and at standards set by animal rights groups, she said.
Pet sales: banning roadside and parking-lot trunk sales
You may have seen it yourself, puppies in boxes being sold at flea markets and from vacant highway lots. Currently, there are no laws prohibiting the practice in the city of Columbia.
“These animals will end up in a shelter at some point,” Riles said. New city rules would ban the sales practice in specific settings.
The proposed new rules would prohibit selling, trading, bartering, leasing or giving away animals for commercial purposes on roadsides and public rights-of-way, public property, commercial parking lots, and at venues such as flea markets, fairs and carnivals.
The city has received multiple complaints about the practice in recent months, Riles noted, also saying that selling pets in this manner promotes irresponsible breeding.
“Oftentimes, you see individuals involved in this activity selling puppies that are too young. Sometimes they’re sickly,” Riles said. “They can’t verify vaccination records, and it’s just not a good situation for the puppies to be in.”
What’s next
Animal Services staff emphasized that tethering and pet sales are only part of a broader rewrite designed to make the city’s animal code clearer and more consistent with modern practices, and to align it with existing rules in Richland County.
The draft includes new definitions and updates to other sections in the ordinance, including kennel and breeding rules, general animal care standards and pet licensing.
The proposed changes are just that, suggestions from the city’s animal services team. The full Columbia City Council would have to approve the rules. For now, committee members are reviewing the proposals before taking any further action.
