Laws About Dog Feces Around Apartment Complexes in Kalamazoo, Michigan

Kalamazoo, Mich., seat of Kalamazoo County in the southwestern part of the state and home to Western Michigan University, is in many ways a typical American college town. Much of its housing stock consists of one-family homes, but college students as well as low- and middle-income families need housing, too, and about half the housing stock in Kalamazoo is renter-occupied. That means apartment complexes, and that means laws for maintaining the Kalamazoo community --- including rules for that most basic of urban services: cleaning up after your dog.

  1. It's the Law

    • A Kalamazoo city ordinance requires dog owners to clean up after their pets. The Kalamazoo City Commission approved an ordinance in 2007, titled "Removal/Disposal of Dog Feces." Dog owners must promptly collect and dispose of any feces "deposited by the dog on public or private property." That includes property around Kalamazoo's apartment complexes. There's an exception to the rule if the dog is on the owner's property. As of May 2011, violators --- owners, not dogs --- pay a $100 fine for a first offense and $200 for a second offense.

    The War on Grime

    • Before the ordinance was approved, Kalamazoo had a pooper-scooper law, but it applied only to city parks. The current ordinance expands the cleanup requirement "to all lands, public or private," said a background report for A. Lee Kirk, city attorney, prepared by the deputy city attorney, Randall S. Schau. The report said the financial impact would be "minimal," meaning that the law change was intended to change dog owners' behavior and the streets' appearance, not fatten the city's treasury.

    Doggy Do's and Don'ts

    • Kalamazoo's Department of Parks and Recreation says dogs are a "welcome component of our urban environment," but pose a greater challenge than canines do in suburbs and rural areas. After all, dogs need to be exercised, and apartment dwellers may not have a backyard to do so --- so owners take their dogs to a nearby Kalamazoo park. "Always clean up after your dog," says the parks department, and if you see another dog's owner not following the cleanup law, "politely ask them to clean up." It would also be helpful, says Parks, if you carried an extra cleanup bag with you, in case you encounter evidence of other pooches' misdeeds.

    Ease on Down the Road

    • The city has opened the Fairmount Dog Park, with amenities including drinking fountains for dogs and their owners --- and "dog waste stations," apparently bureaucratese for waste bins for collecting you-know-what. Until the park opened, dogs could not romp in any city park off the leash. "Stoop and Scoop --- always clean up after your dog and use the dog waste stations," warns the city, which wants the dogs and their owners to have fun without other dogs and owners having to face a mess. The dog park is part of the city's master plan for greener --- and cleaner --- streets, around apartment complexes and everywhere else. The dog park cost more than $200,000.