Iqaluit council neuters dog control committee

MICHAELA RODRIGUE

IQALUIT — Iqaluit town council has decided to hold at least one special meeting to decide what to do about its dog control bylaw.

Council made the decision this week after Paul Landry, representing the Iqaluit Dog Team Association, called for councils two-year-old ad hoc dog control committee to be dissolved and for chair Lynda Gunn to be replaced.

Instead, council will study the information compiled by the committee, along with recommendations brought forward by the dog team association, at one or more special meetings.

“We’ve been talking about this for two years and nothing’s really happened. I don’t think we should really continue with this committee,” said Coun. John Matthews, who proposed that council take action once and for all.

“I think we’re at the point now where council should take responsibility. We have to make decisions,” he said.

Town council struck the ad hoc committee almost two years ago, after six-year-old Iqaluit resident Leah Tikivik was killed by a dog team staked to the sea ice.

The committee, which included dog team owners and concerned parents, was asked to come up with recommendations for changes to Iqaluit’s dog control bylaw on dog teams, loose dogs and public education about dogs.

But the group quickly ran into a deadlock between concerned parents who want more stringent controls over dogs, and dog team owners who object to potential regulations that might force them to keep their dogs located at long distances from the built-up area of town.

Almost two years later, no recommendations have come forward for public debate.

Dog team owners are “frustrated” by the drawn out process and want council to take action, Landry told council members.

“We are frustrated. We don’t see the end in sight,” Landry said. Landry said the ad hoc committee has only partially completed one-third of its job and said that Gunn is biased against dog team owners and has poor facilitation skills.

He reminded councillors that dog team owners have twice submitted their recommendations to council, and he thinks the public should now get a chance to see them.

In the two years since Leah Tikivik’s death, dog team owners in the community have adopted new procedures, such as keeping a minimum distance between each dog on a chain.

Now they want the Town to help bring other recommendations to fruition.

But Gunn said she stands by the research she conducted as chair of the dog control committee, and she said the committee reached a stalemate when dog owners refused to consider keeping dog teams at a specified distance outside of municipal boundaries.

“There was no real attempt to address the proximity question. We kept saying ‘you have to address this,’ ” Gunn said.

Instead, dog team owners have proposed a series of designated dog areas in the town where dogs can have close contact to humans and can be properly socialized.

Both Gunn and Landry agree with council’s decision to disband the committee and hold its own meetings on the issue. Landry urged the Town to meet soon.

“It’s better than having the current committee go on. To have council look at having delegations from the dog team owners, and Lynda’s research and the public makes it a more public process,” Landry said.

“I just hope they don’t set the meetings for months from now.”

Gunn’s research, including legal opinions, will now go before council for debate.

Once council decides how to control dog teams and loose dogs, a new bylaw should be drafted for public debate, Gunn said. She has since consulted a lawyer about all of the recommendations.

No date has been set for the meeting.