The Cairns Regional Council plans to limit the number of dogs in the city more severely, and councilors are expected to vote today for a stricter dog registration program.
The purpose of this audit is to obtain accurate dog registration data for the CRC region, and dogs not registered for dog ownership are scrutinized.
“The purpose is to inspect all properties in the Cairns Regional Council area identified as not having a current dog registration on record,” the application reads.
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There are currently 17,678 dogs registered in the area, but RSPCA statistics show that 39% of all households have dogs, and Cairns has over 42,000 homes, with up to 16,000 unregistered dogs. The council presumes that registered dogs can be caught.
Carol Clifton, treasurer of the Young Animal Protection Society (YAPS), supported the move, saying it should target dog owners who fail to register their pets.
“There are too many unregistered and transsexed dogs,” she said.
“This is something they need to work on and they will have our full support.”
Clifton said she hopes the council’s audit will also help end dog breeding in backyards.
A similar audit held in 2009 cost the council $56,000 and returned 3,100 new registrations and 275 unregistered infringement notices.
A planned six-month audit program will employ staff from an external agency to perform the checks.
“If the council approves, it will seek to obtain a larger contingency of the estimated 16,000 properties that may have unregistered dogs of any size to achieve higher compliance rates.” An analysis will be conducted to see which team is the most suitable,” the document reads.
Staff recruited for proposed audits are required to undergo training “including safe work instructions when encountering dogs on the premises.”
Agency personnel are identified by CRC ID cards.
If the audit is approved, people with unregistered dogs will have little time to cope with the six-month program, which is set to begin on November 10th.
Edgehill dog owners Brett and Julie Collins said it’s important that the council maintains an accurate record of registered dogs and cracks down on owners who violate them.
“If the dog goes missing, registration helps reunite the owner with the dog. It also allows contact with the owner to be registered to hold the dog accountable if they do something wrong.” It also means that there is,” said Collins.
Mrs. Collins added, “Additionally, this is also a way for people to track how many dogs they have, and I think it’s also important to make sure that dangerous breeds are registered.”
Emma Moy of Kanimbla, who has two dogs, said the latest records of dogs in the Cairns area would help the council make an informed decision.
The Collins thought registering dogs with the council would be “not very expensive,” but Moy said that if it weren’t so expensive, “like in the South,” more residents would register their dogs. He said he believed he was deaf.
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