18 April 2003
To the Menlo Park City Council
Good evening,
My name is Ken Bayne. My wife Valerie and I are long-time residents of the Willows at 637 Central Ave. We are unable to speak at the Council Meeting tonight but wanted the Council to know about our regular experiences with "Bear" the dog and with San Mateo Animal Control.
We have three dogs, a Catahoula and two Chihuahuas. We walk them daily and our normal route goes right in front of Bears house. We would regularly see Bear lying in his fenced front yard, typically not even reacting to our dogs, even though our dogs would bark as they walked along the fence line. Occasionally Bear would come to the fence line and bark as well, but with his tail wagging and not showing any aggression (snarling or growling) whatsoever. It appeared as if he just wanted to play.
We also regularly encountered Bear out on walks with his owner. Bear was exceptionally well behaved even though our dogs would typically be barking at Bear. In fact, my wife Valerie was so impressed with Bears behavior she gave him the nickname "The Goodest Boy". Imagine our surprise when we heard "The Goodest Boy" had been designated as dangerous! To us this made no sense.
Our experience with San Mateo Animal Control has not been good. Our Chihuahua was severely bitten (led to an infection and loss of most of his teeth) and my cat mauled to death in her driveway by an animal that subsequently killed another neighbors small dog, yet in that case (for Preeti Sharma), San Mateo Animal Control failed to designate that animal as dangerous! The written finding even acknowledges the animals dangerous behavior, yet they failed to designate the dog as dangerous! How can that be? When we saw others, particularly children, walking their dogs past that house we felt genuine concern for their safety and would warn them to keep their distance. Animal Control should not have allowed that situation to persist. That dog has since been moved out of the Willows and I hope is in a location where it cannot harm any more animals or people.
I did not witness the incident that led to Bears designation, and I clearly support the control of truly dangerous animals, but our experiences with Bear on so many encounters are that Bear is anything but dangerous. We meet many dogs on our walks through the neighborhood and in our experience, Bear is among the best behaved and managed of them all. "The Goodest Boy" gives us zero cause for any safety concerns whatsoever.
I would hope that the City would make the changes necessary to ensure equal and consistent application of the animal control laws to all parties. One dog should not be given a pass after multiple documented kills and concerned witnesses while another is designated as dangerous based on lesser circumstances.
Respectfully,
Ken Bayne
