Council plans to continue with same approach to getting people to clean up after their dogs

On Tuesday morning, Catherine Sammon was walking past the shops on Galtymore Road in Drimnagh, and stopped to talk about dog fouling for a quick minute.  

“It’s everywhere, everywhere – it’s really, really bad,” she says before hurrying off. 

A few steps up the road, Willie Savage, standing in a doorway next to the Spar with a newspaper and a vape, said similar. 

“Most pet owners are responsible,” Savage says. But there are a few who aren’t, he says. 

“They’re just lazy, irresponsible people – it’s disgusting,” says Savage, who says his family has a dog.

Piles of dog poo on the footpaths for people to dodge is not just a problem in Drimnagh, of course, but all across the city. 

At an environment committee meeting earlier this year, Green Party Councillor Carolyn Moore said “Every councillor on this meeting knows that if there’s one issue that comes up relentlessly with people it’s dog fouling.”

In a Dublin Inquirer survey asking people in the city what issues they want candidates standing in this year’s local elections – set for 7 June – to address, dog fouling was among the most-mentioned.  

But when Fianna Fáil Councillor Keith Connolly asked the council how many dog fouling fines it had issued in the past five years, the answer he got back was eight. 

Indeed, council litter prevention officer Bernie Lillis, talking to the environment committee, said she doesn’t really think fining people is the solution. 

The council plans to keep doing what it’s been doing, educating people on the importance of picking up after their dogs, Lillis said.

Small cohort

“The issue of dog fouling, I’d say it’s probably the most challenging issue I’ve had to deal with since I started this job in 2005,” Lillis told members of the council’s Climate Action, Environment and Energy Strategic Policy Committee at its January meeting.

“And I’ve run many, many, many campaigns with the help of very professional people,” she said. “They work for a while and things look really better and you form the opinion that things have improved and then people go back to their old habits again.” 

The council gives out “thousands and thousands” of free dog-poo bags, Lillis said. And it puts up “thousands and thousands” of signs every year. 

“But there are, there’s a cohort of people who just will not clean up after their dogs,” she said.

Eight-three percent of 150 dog walkers surveyed by research firm Behaviour & Attitudes for the council at 13 locations across the city in August 2023 said they always pick up after their dogs. 

Another 13 percent said they almost always do, 3 percent said they do most of the time, and 1 percent said they rarely do. 

“It’s a small number of people who are actually creating the problem for us,” Lillis said. 

At the same meeting, council executive manager Derek Kelly said, “A lot of this is by people who live in that area who are bringing their dogs for a walk and just decide not to clean up after them.”

It’s “not good for public health and it’s certainly not good for having the streets clean and particularly anybody in a wheelchair or anybody like that going along a street they don’t need to be trying to traverse those obstacles – it’s just not fair”, Kelly said. 

The strategy

What is the strategy to tackle dog fouling? Connolly asked the chief executive in early 2023. 

The environment committee set up a working group to look at what could be done to improve the situation, and one of the things the council tried last year was automated reminders to people to pick up after their dogs, says the response he got in May 2023.

“One of the initiatives we have in place at present is an audio visual system where a programmable audio visuals device is placed on poles with a message to users that come into range,” the response said. 

These were put up at 12 sites throughout the city, including the entrance to Poppintree Park and the entrance to Albert College Park – and the plan was to leave them in place for four weeks.

“This overt solution has been proven to significantly change behaviours of users in the area where it has been placed,” the response said. 

The August 2023 survey of dog walkers looked at how effective these audio reminders were.

It found that the share of people who said they always or almost always pick up their dog’s poo was 96 percent in locations with audio reminders, 98 percent in areas where there’d been complaints about the poo situation, and 94 percent in random spots. 

The best way to get to those stubborn few percent who still won’t pick up after their dogs is for the council to hire more wardens to walk around and issue fines to people, said Connolly, the Fianna Fáil councillor. 

“I think people would be more inclined to adhere if there’s a better chance they’ll get caught and fined,” he said.

The challenges of enforcement

At the environment committee meeting, both Kelly, the executive manager, and Lillis, the litter prevention officer, pointed to the difficulty of fining people who don’t pick up after their dogs.

Catching a small number of people spread out across the city, who might be leaving their dog’s poo on ground and walking away at any time of day is tough, Kelly said.

“We can’t be everywhere all the time and a lot of this is by people who live in that area who are bringing their dogs for a walk and just decide not to clean up after them,” Kelly said. 

And even if a council staff member happens upon someone who is walking away with their dog from a steaming pile of poo, it’s hard to fine them.

“It’s extremely challenging to try and take any enforcement action,” Lillis said. To do it council staff have to get gardaí to come along with them, she said.

“Because if we approach a dog owner or a dog walker who hasn’t cleaned up after their dog they do not cooperate with us and that’s putting it very mildly to be honest with you,” she said.

“I think issuing fines is not the thing that’s going to make our cities clean,” Lillis said. “What will make our cities clean is to try and convince those people who don’t pick up after their dog to think of others.” 

In the August 2023 survey of dog walkers, after asking what messaging would most likely convince them to pick up after their dogs, found that “The potential message with highest traction is the need to protect the health of humans, especially children, and respecting other users of the area. Fines come out the lowest.”

So the council will continue with its educational efforts, Lillis said. “As part of the grants that we get from government we’re going to spend it this year on doing another awareness campaign,” she said. 

“And we will be going out to people to ask people the best way to approach this. Because we are spending a lot of money on it and I’d like at some stage to actually get value for money so we can show that there is some kind of improvement on the way,” she said. 

On Tuesday, Connolly, the Fianna Fáil councillor, said he still thinks more wardens, more enforcement, more fines is the way to convince more dog owners to pick up their dog’s poo.

“If you think you’re going to get clamped if you park your car illegally, you’re less likely to park your car illegally,” he says.