City may crack down on puppy brokers

Green Bay dog owners might soon be prohibited from keeping puppy litters unless they can show that the mother dog lives there, too.

A measure headed to the Green Bay City Council is intended to prevent pet brokers from stockpiling large numbers of animals as part of a business enterprise.

City officials say they have found brokers amassing dogs through Internet purchases and then keeping animals in unsanitary conditions.

Current ordinance allows homeowners to keep puppy litters for up to eight weeks, but it does not specify that those puppies must be born there. That has allowed brokers to conduct business using animals obtained online or elsewhere.

In some cases, officials say, dozens of dogs have been stockpiled in squalid conditions.

"It was a loophole that was being abused," said Alderman Joe Moore, who proposed the measure requiring that the mother dog be present.

One dog owner, however, said the crackdown would make it difficult to place stray animals in new homes.

Jamie Leiberg, who keeps dogs at his house on Green Bay's east side, said he works to find them homes for a fee ranging from $175 to $200 each, paid by whoever adopts the animal.

Leiberg said he periodically takes in entire litters of puppies and, at times, has kept as many as 14 dogs in his house at one time.

The city's new proposed ordinance would mean more stray animals on the streets, he said.

"It's not what it means to me. It's what it means to the dogs," he said. "It's going to be a hardship on them."

City ordinance currently allows people to keep two dogs as pets and to seek exceptions for more. A pet owner also can keep a litter of newborn puppies for up to eight weeks.

The City Council Protection & Welfare Committee has endorsed Moore's proposal requiring that the mother dog be present with puppy litters and that she be owned by someone living on site.

The City Council is scheduled to consider the proposal on Sept. 16.

Olivia Webster, operations director for the Bay Area Humane Society, said she supports the measure. Separating newborn puppies from their mother can be unhealthy in many ways, Webster said.

Although unfamiliar with dog brokers operating locally, Webster said she agrees with the city's effort to prevent that sort of activity.

"It just seems like it's a money-making process," she said. "And these people are not caring for the welfare of the animals."

— swilliams@pressgazettemedia.com and follow him on Twitter @pgscottwilliams.