A dog with a bladder that just couldn’t wait while its owner paid a bill at Hinesville City Hall has prompted introduction of an ordinance to ban pets from all Hinesville property, including parks.
“We’ve had issues with animals being brought into city hall and other facilities,” City Manager Billy Edwards said at last week’s city-council meeting.
The council voted to start publicizing the ordinance, which would make it illegal for people to bring most animals onto city property. It does not include service and police dogs and other animals brought to specific events, such as a dog show.
Assistant City Administrator Kenneth Howard said the city’s proposed ordinance is based on a similar one in effect for Liberty County property.
“The city does not have one now,” Howard said.
Violators of the ordinance could draw up to $500 fines in municipal court.
Councilman Keith Jenkins asked whether the city’s leash law also should be addressed, since the proposal would be added to the part of city codes that deal with animals.
Edwards said the council could address more of the code, but asked that this ban not wait for other discussion. It will come up for votes in future meetings.
After the meeting, the city manager didn’t want to discuss the accident in city hall. When asked whether he thinks the ban from parks might make dog owners mad, Edwards said officials are considering establishing a dog park.
In other business, Gabriele Hartage, with the Liberty Consolidated Planning Commission, unveiled proposed changes to the city’s flood ordinance. The changes come from a model ordinance submitted by the Georgia Department of Natural Resources and accompanied an automatic update to flood maps.
“I think we actually had a lot of areas in the county come out of flood zones,” Hartage said about changes to the map.
Changes to the ordinance mostly were clarifications and definitions, she said.
“The only addition worth noting is exclusion of a long list of chemicals that cannot be stored in the 100-year-flood zone,” Hartage said.
Mayor Jim Thomas asked her to bring the issue up at an upcoming work session so council members would have time to study the changes.