Vancouver Dog Pound
by Faith Bloomfield
Dog catchers. These two words evoke images of large scowling men complete with dangling cigarettes and huge nets skulking around back alleys. They offer doggie treats to vagrant dogs as bribes, luring them away from their families to a certain brutal end. A common image, but an inaccurate one.
Today’s dog catchers--animal control officers (ACOs)--are responsible for doing just as their title suggests: controlling animals, specifically dogs. The City of Vancouver Dog Pound’s present mandate is the enforcement of the pound by-law and the registration/licensing of all the city’s dogs. In a sense the pound, located at 1280 Raymur Avenue, is puppy prison--jail for all canine law-breakers. The original pound keeper was a man named John Clough, otherwise known as the “One-Armed Jailer.” Being in charge of the pound in 1886 was just one of the many roles he played in the new and growing city. (Clough was also the jailer and caretaker of Vancouver’s first prison and he kept the city bright as its lamplighter) The pound changed a great deal when it became a part of city hall and currently it is a division of the permits and licenses department. No longer an arm of the police ACOs are often called upon by the police to apprehend vicious or nuisance dogs in many high-risk situations.
In Clough’s time dogs were just one kind of animal that needed tending. Cows and horses were also common visitors to the premises in those days. As recently as the late 1970s a steer was picked up by the pound at the Fraserview Golf Course after wandering back and forth from Vancouver to the Central Park area in Burnaby for three weeks. The pound officers, unfamiliar with the practice of hitching in an animal, found the cow moving around excessively in the back of their trailer. Soon the cow was halfway out, right in the middle of one of the busiest parts of town--the intersection of Davie and Denman Streets. The Stanley Park Zoo curator was called in to help calm the situation and eventually the steer, whose owner refused to claim him, reached his final destination. Chickens, roosters and rabbits can also sometimes be found in the kennels these days and calls about stray Vietnamese pot-bellied pigs and loose ferrets are also noted.
The pound does not handle live cats but it is not unusual for calls to come in for an ACO to pick up a dead cat from a city street. Cleaning up after dead animals found in public areas in Vancouver is one of the pound’s less pleasant responsibilities.
Dogs are rarely put to sleep at the pound, contrary to another all-too-common misconception. In the last few decades less than five per cent of impounded dogs--dogs picked up as loose strays, unregistered and unlicensed--were put to sleep. The ones that are destroyed are found to be unsuitable as pets because of nasty dispositions or health problems. The other 95 per cent or so are either returned to their rightful owners or adopted out to new and hopefully more responsible people.
Licensing has always been a long process for the ACOs as many dog owners refuse to purchase annual tags. In the past pound officers were sworn in every year by the deputy-chief of police as special constables. This allowed them to follow up notices to license with court summonses--an almost weekly occurrence. This policy changed in the 1970s and presently ACOs must rely on the dog owner’s honesty. Unfortunately, frequent return house calls are required and some delinquent dog owners must be fined as a last resort.
Long before computers, addresses where licensed dogs lived were hand-written in what was then called a route book. The pound officer always took his book out on the road with him and revised it every time a license was sold. During the big rush at the start of every year pound officers were known to work through their lunch just to keep their book up to date with all the licenses sold. In 1946 just under 17,000 tags were sold and hand-entered by the pound officers. The method advanced slightly in 1973 when a filing system was adopted by the pound and a clerk was hired to process licensing information. In 1977, after a steady increase over the years, the highest number of tags--almost 25,000--were sold and recorded.
In 1987 dog license sales were finally recorded into a computer program set up by city hall. Now the pound inputs the information itself with about two-thirds of its annual license sales processed in the first three months of the calendar year. Every dog licence, current and expired, has a constantly updated, four-year history within the pound files, easily accessible to every ACO and pound employee. In 1994 fewer than 16,000 tags were sold. Suggested reasons for the decreases, steady since 1977, are the increasingly high cost of licensing and the opening in that year of the SPCA spay/neuter clinic: fewer puppies being born means fewer dogs licences needed.
As public servants ACOs must enforce the city pound bylaw and respond to citizens complaints of dog owners responsible for “poop and scoop” and leash offenses, dogs running at large and numerous vicious-dog infractions. Each violation-past and present--is recorded on the dog’s computer record.
At one time the poundkeeper had a permit to carry and use a rifle if a situation demanded such action. In 1974, when a new supervisor arrived at the pound, he returned both the rifle and its ammunition to city hall administrators. Although the rifle was banned the equipment used is still critical, if nowhere near as dangerous. Among ACOs the “weapon” of choice is a throwback from a time when the pound budget was extremely tight. George Masse, poundkeeper from the mid- 1940s to 1974, recycled the heavily soiled trolley cable cords discarded by BC Electric, now BC Hydro. Today the ACOs complain that newer ropes, made of the same fibres and slip-knotted like the old ones, don’t hold as well. Often a catch pole--an aluminum pole with a cable loop attached to it--is also used to prevent vicious dogs from attacking the attending officer.
In 1987 Vancouver city council gave the pound authority to deal with dangerous dogs by modifying the pound by-law to include a vicious-dog section. The breed-specific amendment declared all pitbulls and pitbull cross breeds vicious, as well as all dogs found to be vicious as a result of an incident and follow-up investigation by the pound. The breed-specific area of the by- law came after a public outcry resulted from increased awareness of vicious attacks by these dogs. The section required owners of these dogs to follow additional rules: besides leashing, vicious dogs must be muzzled and strictly contained.
The public reacts to media portrayals of vicious-dog attacks strongly and in the past a variety of breeds--German shepherds, Doberman pinschers, Saint Bernards, Huskies, etc.--all made “vicious dog of the month” though none were officially deemed vicious until the pitbull scare. Not all the ACOs agree with the breed-specific wording of the section of the by-law and the sentiment often heard around the pound is “there are no bad dogs, just bad owners.” In fact in Kitsilano in the early 1970s a pound officer was attacked and bitten--by a man! Historically officers of the pound are victims of violent reactions, both verbal and physical, from the public, as emotions are strained where the family pet is concerned. Pound lore has it that in the 1960s an intoxicated man attacked pound officer Robert Neale after he arrived at the family home with their dog, Snuffy. The dog owner was charged with assault and fined $50 by the magistrate.
There is no “animal control officer school” and every officer has his or her own method of doing the job. As a side-line some officers work outside the pound training championship show dogs and hunting dogs. There have been officers who rely on nothing but sheer patience and will to get dogs to teach themselves. And there was even an officer who “talked” to the dogs, using “psychology” to get the job done. But the only real training ACOs get comes on the job. They are required to know the pound by-law and all health regulations relating to animals. But most essential for a successful career with the pound is a quick sense of timing and a sometimes off- beat sense of humor!
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