Kyiv petition for dog walking zones falls short of required signatures

A petition on the Kyiv City Council website calling to eliminate legal uncertainty in dog walking rules and to create a network of modern walking zones in the capital has failed to gather the number of votes required for consideration.

According to the petition platform on the Kyiv City Council website, this initiative was submitted on April 2, and as of June 1, the petition had gathered only 1,000 votes out of the 6,000 required.

"The current ‘Rules for Keeping Domestic Dogs and Cats in the City of Kyiv’ and the ‘Regulations on the Functioning of Places and Zones for Walking Animals in the City of Kyiv’ use evaluative and vague wording regarding dog walking areas, including terms such as ‘the back side of the building,’ ‘the technical side,’ and ‘near residential buildings.’ These terms have no definition in legislation, which leads to their arbitrary interpretation. The lack of clear criteria creates a situation of legal uncertainty," the petition read.

The author of the petition stated that in practice, this leads to: constant conflicts between residents due to differing interpretations of the boundaries of what is "allowed"; selective enforcement and the impossibility of objective control by the police or the Municipal Guard; and the lack of real infrastructure for walking dogs in most districts of the city.

In this regard, the author requested: to exclude all evaluative formulations from the city’s regulatory acts; to create a network of modern dog parks; to digitalize walking zones; and to ensure transparent control.

As reported, in 2017, the Kyiv City Council amended the decision "On Regulating the Keeping and Handling of Dogs and Cats in the City of Kyiv," which prohibits walking domestic dogs and cats on the premises of pre-school and general education institutions.