Q&A on dog waste fines vs. dispenser approach
A reporter asks why the Council chose dispensers over raising fines like LA and Chicago did to $500. Menin explains that without enforcement staff, higher fines wouldn't deter behavior, and the holistic SCOOP Act approach targets the problem from multiple angles.
Hi, Madam Speaker.
I'm wondering if you could talk about the decision to, specifically on the wastebasket bill, or the waste bag bill.
Can you talk about the decision to spend the money on that versus raising the fine?
I know Los Angeles and Chicago, they raised their dog fines to $500.
Was that a consideration at all?
The issue is no matter what the fine was, it was not deterring conduct because there's very little to no enforcement.
There is not enough enforcement staff to go out there and actually be able to enforce it and see it.
And to Councilmember Brewer's point, it's very hard.
You have to actually catch someone in action, so to speak, and that can be really challenging to do.
So we felt the best thing to do was this package of bills holistically, the Scoop Act, which is, you know, there's my bill, which, again, attaches the actual dog waste dispenser bags to over 1,200 litter baskets.
And we're going to focus on areas that have the most dog waste complaints.
Then there are other components of the bill that focus on the package, that focus on public education.
So, again, we're trying to attack it from a multitude of different ways.
And the proof will be in the pudding.
We're going to obviously monitor the complaints and see, are these bills working?
And if they're not lowering it, then we'll consider additional action.
But we want to do things that actually work.
And just raising the fine, there's not enforcement.
So that wouldn't, we don't believe.
Would have made a difference.