At last week’s Greene County Supervisors meeting, Sheriff Steve Haupert discussed a growing problem in the county dealing with animal control calls.

He says 10-15% of the total calls that they receive are about animal control issues.  Majority of the calls are reports about dogs running at large and not necessarily that the canines are posing problems, just that they gEt loose.

Haupert points out one big problem has been the response time he and his deputies have in regards to those kinds of calls.

“Somewhat unfair when we have a deputy in the western part of the county and needs to be in Grand Junction (eastern part) for an animal control call that they’re not there.  If we’re on another call, a half-an-hour or 45 minutes before we’re there and of course you know the dog’s not going to stand there and wait for you.”

He comments that it’s difficult to track down the dogs that get loose but that they do write citations for repeat offenders with the 28E agreements with the surrounding cities in the county with the exception of Jefferson.

Haupert suggests to hire an animal control person for the county that could respond to those kinds of calls and if the deputies aren’t busy, they could also help that person especially if there are multiple animal control calls in multiple locations in the county.

He also recommends establishing a county-wide ordinance to provide for a more unified code between all the cities.

“Right now the (animal control) codes for towns are a little bit different.  So wherever they are in the county doing animal control that it will be a unified citation or a code for that.”

Haupert adds that he would like to see a county-wide animal facility that can house all these animals and provide treatment as part of the animal control person’s responsibility.

The Supervisors didn’t take action on the topic pending further information and data needing to be collected.