Kauai new ordinances

After all the Bill 2491 / Ordinance 960 hubbub last year the legislative activities of the county council have been relatively quite. I recently heard about new county legislation to address the long-standing issue of dealing with barking dogs had passed but it took quite an effort to find it online. This seems like a good reminder so I managed to dig up all the recent new county law.

Here is a summary with links to the actual details. Obviously the law is more complicated than a simple summary so read the linked text if you want to understand the details.

Ordinance 960 - "The Bill" (more precisely Bill 2491) about pesticides and GMO.

Ordinance 961 - Repeals temporary exemptions to ease rebuilding after Hurricane Iniki (well over twenty years ago). Specifically, repeals Ordinances 642, 649, 653, 689, and 716.

Ordinance 962 - Provides exemption from solid waste dumping fees for volunteer public space cleanups.

Ordinance 965 - Provides mandatory licensing for pet cats.

Ordinance 966 - Extends the deadline for homeowners to apply for the Home Preservation Tax Limit (a low income property tax reduction) this year.

Ordinance 967 - Barking dog law.

Ordinance 968 - Changes some fees for solid waste disposal and incorporates the public cleanup exemption of Ordinance 962.

Ordinance 969 - Updates county vehicle tax raising rates.

I do not know why numbers 963-964 were skipped.

The barking dog ordinances carefully defines nuisance barking and imposes escalating fines after an attempt at remediation. A dog violates the ordinance if it "barks, bays, cries, or howls intermittently for a period of twenty (20) minutes within a thirty (30) minute period of time, or continuously or incessantly for a period of ten (10) minutes." It's not easy to define exactly what constitutes a problem but I'm not sure this is the definition I would come up with. I am not a lawyer but I think like art it is something people generally recognize when they see hear it.

Let's hope nobody has a dog next door that barks for nine minutes continuously then takes a six minute rest as I don't believe that qualifies as a violation!

It's nice to see the council addressing contentious issues without an island-wide firestorm. Hope it works.