Your dog has a price on his head
Now that various newspapers are available “online”, I have a moral obligation to read those from places where I used to live. No matter about the present, because a man delivers a paper copy each morning around about the time I start my coffee and the dog goes ballistic. Or maybe she goes into overdrive because a man delivers a paper copy, and it has nothing to do with my coffee. (More research needed on this question). Back to places where I used to live and the concerned media.
The town of Stratford (old name for “Place that watches Charlottetown, jealously“) has decided that the fee structure for taxation of domestic animals needs alteration. In municipal terms, alteration stands for “augmentation” and domestic animals refers ONLY to canis domesticus. This behaviour is not unique to Stratford; we face the same species-specific strategy here, in a city of more than half a million. Nor is the complete absence of any service in return for the offensive tax unique. Many cities feel that the very presence of man’s best friend is a free invitation to institutionalized larceny.
Locally, a team of students go from door to door during their summer work period. If there is any sign of a dog at home, (think leashes, holes in lawn, abandoned bones), they leave a piece of paper inciting payment of additional monies to the city, under guise of a bylaw number. There are penalties for non-payment. And there lies the flaw. The only time a homeowner has contact with this particular tax structure is during the summer work period. Once the (poorly paid) student has returned to studies, there is no additional money to pay for the police effort needed to collect the fee. I speak from years of ignorance of the law.
There is an idiom that says “Their bark is worse than their bite”. For the dog owners who have responded to the story in today’s Guardian, I suggest waiting until the dog days have passed. Carry on with caring for your best friend; nothing else really matters. And yes, I realize that Keppoch isn’t technically the same as Stratford, but in the absence of an accurate map…
