The Waitsfield Select Board reaffirmed a July 8, 2019, decision regarding a High Bridge Hill Road dog issue at its meeting this week.
The 2019 decision by the board was to require dog owners William and Lisa Stevenson to remove two dogs, Cami and Rocco, from their High Bridge Hill Road property. That decision stemmed from an attack by Cami and Rocco on Tilly, a dog owned by Eileen Turner and her family, also of High Bridge Hill Road.
After that attack, in which Tilly was grievously injured, the select board held a hearing in June 2019 and followed up with a July 8, 2019, hearing, initially asking that the Stevenson’s remove Cami from their property and the town and, then during that hearing amending that request to have both dogs removed from the town.
Fast forward to July 22 of this summer when the Turners notified town animal control officer Fred Messer to let him know that Rocco was back on the Stevenson’s property. Messer contacted the Stevensons to remind them of the board’s July 2019 order and reported that William Stevenson said he’d never seen a copy of the final order and had only seen the June 2019 draft order (which called for removing Cami from their property and the town). Rocco has been kept on the property without incident since 2019.
“We are now at a crossroads. We can reaffirm the board’s 2019 decision or revisit this issue and decide how to proceed,” town administrator Annie Decker-Dell’Isola told the board this week.
Board member Chach Curtis, who was not on the board in 2019, asked if there had been any new incidents with Rocco in the interim and was told there were no incidents, but there was new awareness of the dog’s presence on the property.
“The dog has been under control then?” asked board member Brian Shupe.
“It caused great consternation for the Turners,” Messer said.
Messer explained that while Cami was the initial aggressor in the attack on the Turner dog, both dogs were involved and both were running at large at the time and the board decided to ban both dogs.
Shupe said he was nervous about the board taking action with none of the 2019 members on the board and asked Messer for his take on the decision. Messer said he relied on the research and work of former town administrator Trevor Lashua, who had experience with viscious dog incidents prior to coming to Waitsfield.
“We found the unsigned order and there was debate at the July 2019 meeting and in reaction to it, the order was revised to say that both dogs had to go. It wasn’t signed by the board chair and the Stevenson’s said they never received a copy of it,” Curtis clarified.
“It’s possible there was a signed final order but it was hard to find any documentation that it was amended to include both dogs,” Decker-Dell’Isola explained.
“If we assume it was an oversight, we can reaffirm and sign it now and don’t have to reopen the hearing,” Curtis said and board chair Christine Sullivan said that was her recommendation.
The board voted to affirm the 2019 decision.
