Dogs may soon receive some relief from tethering in Cobb County.
A public hearing and an expected final vote by the Cobb County Board of Commissioners will be held 7 p.m. March 28 in the BOC Board Room, second floor, 100 Cherokee St., Marietta. They will decide whether to change the county code for dog tethering. A trolley system, instead of single-point tethering, would be the major change with no choke or pinch collars.
Tether means “any chain, rope, leash, tie out or wire designed to restrain a dog which is attached to a dog’s collar or halter and is also attached to a stationary object,” according to county code. No longer would tethering be allowed as “a means of primary enclosure.” As a secondary restraint, the running cable line or trolley system only would be allowed under these conditions:
- Only one dog may be attached to each running cable line or trolley system.
- Tethers and cables attaching the dog to the running cable line or trolley system must be made of a substance which cannot be chewed through by the dog.
- The length of the tether from the running cable line or trolley system to the dog's collar should allow access to the maximum available exercise area and allow the dog free access to food, water and adequate shelter.
- The dog must be attached to the tether by a properly fitted harness or collar with enough room between the harness or collar and the dog's throat through which two fingers may fit. Choke collars and pinch collars are prohibited for tethering a dog.
- The running cable or trolley system must be a sufficient distance from any other objects or dogs to prohibit the tangling of the cable, to prohibit the cable from extending over an object or an edge that could result in injury or strangulation of the dog and be of sufficient distance from any fence to prohibit the dog from having access to the fence.
During the first public hearing on Feb. 28, eight speakers all spoke against unsupervised tethering during inclement weather but some favored the trolley system of tethering as a start to revising the county code to be comparable to other Georgia counties.
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