After more than a years-long discussion and an organized petition, the City of Unalaska recently updated the local pet control ordinance. The Unalaska Department of Public Safety implemented a zone where dogs are required to be leashed, covering most of the residential and commercial areas within city limits.
But some organizers of the petition now say their efforts to change city code and harshen leash laws may have backfired.
Suzi Golodoff, who has lived in Unalaska for roughly 50 years, led the petition that started a city-wide conversation in the spring of 2024 about dog leash laws in Unalaska.
“We just felt that we had grown to the point as a community that maybe we should do a little better with sharing space and maybe respecting our more vulnerable people — people with little kids, or older people, or people that don't want to be approached by dogs,” Golodoff said.
After a string of dog attack reports, including an attack by a group of malamutes fatally wounding another pet, Golodoff collected about 50 signatures from community members asking the city council to reevaluate its dog leash laws.
The petition initially asked for stricter enforcement of the local animal control ordinance, that all dogs be leashed at all times on public lands.
But Golodoff said the petition didn’t produce the results she’d hoped for.
“All our efforts have made it worse,” she said.
Under the new ordinance, which council members approved in September, all dogs have to be leashed or confined in the centralized town area, where most homes and businesses are. On a map displaying the boundaries, the new leash zone is shown in orange. Everything outside of that is in green, meaning dogs may be off-leash. Most of the off-leash area isn’t accessible by car and is mainly tundra with hiking trails.
Prior to the council’s changes, the ordinance only required voice control in city limits, but city officials have said that is difficult to regulate. Dogs should still be under control by voice command but can run free in off-leash zones within the city limits, but only with the land owner’s permission.
City officials previously considered changes to the local laws, one of which could have required dogs to be leashed while off the owner’s property or other private property. But most Unalaska homes have small yard space and few are fully fenced. Several community members and council members voiced concern that this wouldn’t be fair to responsible pet owners.
Council member Thom Bell said at a recent council meeting that he supports the ordinance, calling it a compromise.
“Not a great compromise, but a good compromise,” Bell said. “The idea that we include all the city limits, [that] covers a lot of area, I think, an excessive amount.”
Much of the green area where dogs can run free is owned and managed by the Ounalashka Corporation — Unalaska’s Native corporation — a major landowner on the islands. The corporation allows public access of its land with a permit and aligns its regulations with the city’s ordinance to “provide consistent guidelines.”
Dog owners are expected to control their animals and stop them from approaching others either by voice control or leash on OC land. Those who create unsafe conditions or harm or injure others will lose their land use permits, according to OC officials.
Golodoff said she was hoping the city might create a dog park, turning popular areas of the island where people already run their dogs into off-leash zones.
“What they've done is taken that away and said that all those acres, all that land, no leash law — that's your dog park,” Golodoff said. “But if you want to walk around without dogs nipping and biting and chasing and frightening you, well, we've created this little space for you on Strawberry Hill and behind the airport.”
She said she feels like the city has created less of a dog park and more of what she called a “people park.”
Local Jose Lopez wrote to the council in support of the changes. He said he felt they solved the island’s leashing issues.
“The ordinance, as proposed, strikes a fair balance,” a city clerk said at a September meeting, reading Lopez’s comment. “It applies leash laws on public rights-of-ways and city-owned properties, while allowing private property owners to make their own decisions. This avoids overstepping and ensures responsible pet owners are not unfairly punished by symbolic rules that may lack enforcement in the future.”
While Lopez supported the new ordinance, Golodoff said she feels the city completely missed the target on addressing her and other petitioners’ concerns.
In a subsequent letter addressed to the council, Golodoff compared this moment to when the city limited smoking to designated areas.
“We know that while people may want to smoke wherever they want, we can’t reasonably allow that, because it jeopardizes the well being of the whole,” Golodoff wrote. “We don't do that to each other. We offer designated smoking areas. Now we have come to this same situation with dogs.”
Still, council member Daneen Looby said the change of ordinance isn’t necessarily the final word on the matter, but a good compromise for now. She said it’s a start “in order to move forward and to progress with the times as the population increases — and the dog population has increased as well.”
Under the updated code, all dogs must be vaccinated for rabies and registered annually with the city.
Fines for things like having an unlicensed dog have increased from $50 to $200. The fine for a vicious dog has doubled. And failure to immunize your dog will now cost you $500 instead of $200.
