Park Cities Poop Patrol. The Dog Doo-Doo Leavers Would Finally Get What They Deserve.

I’d link to a column I wrote a few years ago about dog owners who leave disgusting waste behind (not that carrying it around in a clear bag is much more appealing but at least it’s not in my yard) but, as I’ve mentioned about 97 times, that content is unavailable.

Anyway. University Park and Highland Park need to join forces and require residents to register every dog in town just like these brilliant peeps in Baltimore. Then when there’s random nasty, funk on your property you could call the UP/HP Poop Patrol. They would zoom over with sirens blazing, pick it up, test it, and issue tickets to offenders. Really. Expensive. Tickets.

My job here is done.

By Merritt Patterson May. 19, 2010 | 2:27 pm | 24 Comments | Comments RSS
24 comments to "Park Cities Poop Patrol. The Dog Doo-Doo Leavers Would Finally Get What They Deserve."
  1. khaki @ May 19, 2010 at 4:41 pm
    I have a neighbor that bags it up & leaves the tiny little baggies on the sidewalk . . . . I’m not sure who she thinks is going to pick it up. At first, I thought she’d set it down for a second while taking the dogs inside. But then, they were regularly left for days?

    No matter what her reasoning, I’m sure the police will be happy it’s bagged when they come pick it up.

    Merritt, you may have seen these little baggies of biohazards on your walks. They are veeeery near an area where you have written about walking.

  2. Mom of Boys @ May 19, 2010 at 4:54 pm
    OMG! I love this! My favorite is when the offending owner is looking away intently while their beloved does his business in other’s yards. Like they are so engrossed in whatever is in the yard next door or the neighboring tree that they don’t “notice” what’s happening. How do we sign up for this? Neighbors, we need to get the city on board with this idea!

  3. GMOM @ May 19, 2010 at 5:06 pm
    I just wish your job was done here – shut-up. Could you just cease and desist from all yer biatchin’. Dam girl, are you trying out for the conscience of the Park Cities, well stop it, we’re all adults here and we don’t need the critisism. We can bumble along just fine without all your
    negative in-put. It’s summer, let’s have some happy news.
    What you say??? Oh wait, I see another one of your head-lines – PC – One Giant Bird Toilet – Wha?????????
    Perfect example. Move to Oak Cliff and let us know where you would rather live. Why did you leave Plan-o?

  4. Kersten Rettig @ May 19, 2010 at 7:27 pm
    Ooh, GMOM is mean. Leave Merritt alone or get off this blog. And also you need spell check big time.

  5. Gadfly @ May 19, 2010 at 8:15 pm
    Someone needs to take a happy pill. I for one am tired of having to clean up the poop in my front garden, which is usually deposited in the cloak of darkness.

    I personally hope that Merritt continues with these kinds of observations. GMOM is wrong about her opinion that we’re all adults. Clearly this isn’t the case.

  6. whatever! @ May 19, 2010 at 8:41 pm
    We used to have a neighbor whose dog would pee on my front steps every morning (big puddle when I went out to get the paper) and poop in my yard every day. One day, I picked the poop up (with a bag, of course), walked it down the block, and dropped the pile all over his newspaper. Never happened again. He moved a few months later.

    If you choose to have a pet, all of it’s “processes” are your problem, not your neighbors’. I don’t dump my cats’ litter box in my neighbors’ front yard. It’s incredibly self-absorbed to think that your lifestyle choice should become work for other people.

  7. AMOM @ May 19, 2010 at 8:54 pm
    Does GMom even have a dog? Probably not or she’d get the genius of the article…..and the LOL of it! Thanks Merritt for sharing the article with us.

  8. UP Dog Lover @ May 20, 2010 at 6:22 am
    Yes, yes, yes to poop patrol. Doesn’t the city of UP have a budget deficit this year? Hmmmm….
    I have an 82 lbs dog and he usually does his business in our back yard. I walk him at least 2/day and in case he needs to go again, I have a baggie with me. Always. Period.
    Unfortunately, many people do not. I also end up having to clean up other people’s mess left in my front yard and in the alley. Why should I? This makes my blood boil.
    Clearly, not everyone who lives here behaves like an adult.

    PS. GMom, you are just rude.

  9. TB @ May 20, 2010 at 8:36 am
    As the recession continues (at least for jobs), the comments seem to be getting nastier. Lots of unresolved anger in our little islands of paradise.

  10. grump @ May 20, 2010 at 9:12 am
    GMOM & RU486 are cute. Let’s troll a blog and then complain about it.
    That much hostility towards Merritt must mean you were the object of one of her “outtings”.

  11. kmom @ May 20, 2010 at 9:44 am
    I think if they look up the IP addy’s they’ll find GMOM and RU486 are the same person. Lousy spelling and all. Obviously GMOM is a dog owner, and an irresponsible one – the guilty dog barks the loudest. GMOM, you do know that those that work at the paper know who you are, right?

    This would be awesome, if they didn’t have a backlog of years and years of people DNA to do, and the outlandish cost. There are innocent folks in jail waiting years, even decades for the DNA to be run on their old cases so they can be released. Until all that is caught up, I think we’ll have to wait on the poop problem. And I am all for taking your neighbors dog poop back to them. I hadn’t thought of putting it on their paper, but putting it on their porch is more than fair. With a note if you are brave enough.

  12. citygirl @ May 20, 2010 at 10:06 am
    Well I thought it was funny. And if GMom wasn’t amused by it she should have just skipped this post all together.

  13. Bluebird @ May 20, 2010 at 11:11 am
    I always pick up after my dog. I carry a bag holder attached to her leash and use opaque bags. It is frusterating when I have to pick up after other dogs in my front yard and especially in the alley. The dogs like our trashcans and I’ve had a few unwelcome surprises so walking your dig in the alley does not excuse the need to pick up after your beloved pet. Just do it!

  14. bdad @ May 20, 2010 at 11:41 am
    This blog post is one of the better examples, in my opinion, of the journalistic wit that I love about Merritt’s writing. In just two paragraphs about a mundane, but annoying activity in our little twin cities, she managed to elicit lots of responses, laugh at ourselves, and even managed to throw Dan under the bus (“as I’ve mentioned about 97 times, that content is unavailable”). I don’t always agree, but she does spark a response, doesn’t she? I mean, who else could have elicited 39 comments on yet-another-Bradfield-yearbook posting? Or 26 comments on Google-vs-Encyclopedia?

    Now, can someone come up with a good way to get my neighbors with their big labs to recognize how much their dogs poops all over my yard and put a leash on the dogs? Hints have failed. I’ve got to live with these people for a long, long time.

    And PS: Include the damn cats in the DNA database!

  15. RU486 @ May 20, 2010 at 12:33 pm
    Gmom and I are two different people.
    I think Merritt is great.
    I just have an issue w/ K Rettig (no journalistic integrity-just gossip)…
    As a paid employee of PCP, is it proper to use this platform to beat down any1 that doesn’t agree the public flogging (by PCP) of Sue Ann Reeves?

  16. kmom @ May 20, 2010 at 12:40 pm
    I use the newspaper bags as on the walk poop bags. Sunday paper bags are the best. Here’s a question – if you are walking by an alley with a poop bag in your hand, you see garbage cans lined up – is it a big faux pas to lift a lid and toss in your neatly tied up bag o poop?

  17. bdad @ May 20, 2010 at 1:06 pm
    @kmom, YES it is a faux pas to throw your dog’s crap into someone else’s garbage cans. Carry your dog’s poop home! And don’t throw it down the street drain either, as I saw one guy do.

  18. Kersten Rettig @ May 20, 2010 at 1:17 pm
    That’s right, The Abortion Pill and GMOM have two different IP addresses. GMOM has been around a while, RU486 is a newbie and has a personal issue with me which I have zero desire to engage.

  19. Gadfly @ May 20, 2010 at 1:23 pm
    kmom, the reason that it is a faux pas to toss the poop in somebody’s can, is because the garbage collectors do not lift the whole can and dump the trash into their truck. They just lift the big bags out and leave all the small debris behind. After finding 2 dead rats cooking in their juices, empty beer cans, taco wrappers, and construction crud (none of which belonged to me), I had a hissy fit and called the UP sanitation department. They listen, but nothing has changed. And UP would not pick up the rats. I ended up paying extra for Terminix to come out and deal with them, and six months later, the cans still stink.

  20. kmom @ May 20, 2010 at 3:04 pm
    I didn’t think it was cool to be stashing your poop in other cans, I’ve just witnessed it being done several times. YUCK on the rats. Off topic, we had a squirrel get hit by a car and killed in the street at the end of my driveway – mid day-ish, noonish. I was going to have my husband deal with it when he got home(shovel into a plastic bag, double bag it and put it on our trash can – my he-man hero) The city showed up and had it all cleaned up in no time at all, less than two hours from when it happened. UP street services rocks.

  21. Avid Reader @ May 20, 2010 at 4:34 pm
    RU486: Kersten has never stepped over any line and is one of the classier posters, period. She should give lessons. SAR deserved a public flogging for publicly flogging all the elementary kids pictures and info all over the internet, as well as costing the school $11K+ for her hissy fit. I am so curious how anyone with any common sense could defend her?

    We should all start taking camera pics of dog poop offenders and sending them to Merritt for posting like the parking violators.

  22. Kersten Rettig @ May 20, 2010 at 4:48 pm
    Awwwww. Thanks, Avid Reader. That makes my day.

  23. GMOM @ July 2, 2010 at 1:48 pm
    OK Girls, Kings X, You all are wanting to do DNA, photos,
    publicly embarass citizens of PC. I have 4 dogs and 1 cat for your info and they pick up their own poo. I also feed the birds and I dare say they don’t pick up their own poo. What shall I do? I know complain!! HP celebrates its 100th birthday in 2013 and we have seemed to all get along just fine without the negativism for all these years and I have been around almost as long.
    Get into taking pictures of the yard guys blowing dust and grass from one yard to another. What’s the problen with bagging it, it all winds up in the gutters and clogging them up and eventually into the creeks. Take pictures of construction sites with all the food wrappers,
    empty drink cups, trash that blows around should a wind occur. The “roach coaches” that drive around that don’t have permits to do business in the PC and we don’t make them pay sales tax = town income. Just a thought. Love ya. Have a safe 4th!!!

  24. r2d2 @ August 30, 2010 at 12:56 pm
    i like the photo idea. hmmmm……but they never do it if you are there, maybe google earth can help.

    also, i hate the leaf blowers myself, is that violating any law, permit, or such, or is it just rude?

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