Whakatāne District Council is no longer considering imposing a limit of two dogs per urban household.

The council’s draft Dog Control Bylaw is open for submissions after being approved for consultation at a recent strategy and policy committee meeting.

When it was first presented to the council at a briefing in February after being reviewed by staff, one of the recommended changes was to introduce the limit for urban residential properties.

The aim was to reduce the risk of dog attacks and intimidation along with noise, nuisance and welfare issues, and to manage stray dog populations.

The suggestion met with mixed views at the February briefing with some councillors voicing concerns about people who kept packs of hunting dogs to help feed their families being unfairly penalised.

Staff did further research and analysis, and when the draft document came to the committee for approval in March, this change had been removed.

Senior strategic policy analyst Harvey Keravel said the limit had been withdrawn because it was found to be “administratively challenging”.

Regulation monitoring team leader Mike Mackenzie later told Local Democracy Reporting the decision was based on data showing that only a small proportion of dog owners in Whakatāne had more than two dogs registered and those owners rarely caused problems.

“Introducing a strict bylaw limiting dog numbers could be seen as unnecessary or an undue restriction on responsible dog owners,” he said.

Just over 200 of the 3400 registered dog owners in the district were registered as having more than two dogs.

Animal control staff rarely needed to ask owners with multiple dogs to reduce their numbers and in most cases where they had, the dogs were unregistered.

“In situations where multiple dogs do become problematic, such as roaming or persistent barking, existing mechanisms already allow staff to require owners to reduce their dog numbers,” Mr Mackenzie said.

The draft policy now also includes four new sites along Pikowai Beach where dogs will be restricted for the protection of nesting birds.

These are the beach and dune areas around Hauone, Pikowai, Herepuru and Mimiha streams.

Dog control maps to inform dog owners where they can take their dogs and under what restrictions are being improved to make them more user-friendly after members of the public said they were difficult to understand.

The Dog Control Bylaw is being updated along with the Dog Control Policy and six other bylaws.

Further details and information about how to make a submission is available on the council’s consultation website, [email protected]

People can also make submissions at any council office.