They’re on poop patrol.
The City Council is waging a war against dog poop – passing four laws aimed at cleaning up the city’s rampant pet feces problem on Thursday.
The slate of bills – which passed with a veto-proof majority – includes a mandate to install at least 1,200 dog waste bag dispensers on public trash cans, a three-year PSA campaign and a volunteer poop-pickup program seeking to turn dog waste into compost.
The council’s pet project, coined the ‘SCOOP Act’ , will cost the city roughly $180,000 in fiscal year 2027, in what the body is calling a “modest investment” to curb the poo-problem.
“We’re trying to attack it from a multitude of different ways, and the proof will be in the pudding,” Speaker Julie Menin said at a press conference.
A staggering 2,926 dog waste complaints have been submitted to 311 year-to-date, up 45.5% from the same time last year. A committee report on the bills from 2024 found that city pups produce an impressive 500,000 pounds of waste daily.
While other cities like Los Angeles and Chicago have opted to boost fines for irresponsible pet owners, Menin argued that reprimanding lazy pet parents while they’re on the go is harder than it looks.
“No matter what the fine was, it was not deterring conduct because there’s very little to no enforcement,” Menin said.
“You have to actually catch someone in action, and that can be really challenging to do,” she said of the current city policy that fines derelict owners $250 for leaving their dog’s mess behind.
But the Department of Sanitation – which is required to oversee the dog waste bag dispensers on public trash bins – claimed they do not have the capacity to restock the bags.
“DSNY simply does not have the resources to routinely restock the bags at any kind of scale,” the DSNY claimed in a testimony in May. “And what could be worse than walking your dog, expecting to find bags available and finding an empty dispenser.”
The city already does marketing campaigns encouraging pet owners to clean up after their furry friends, but the new legislation will require a public education and outreach program, along with signs at the entrances and exits of all city parks.
A pilot program by Council member Harvey Epstein will also work with already established volunteers at the city’s more than 80 dog-runs to install dog-feces collection bins and compostable waste bags – that will be used for composting and published in a public study.
“We have to use every tool in our toolbox to advance our environmental policies and this is just one piece of a large puzzle,” Epstein said.
