Rhian Ross, lead animal control officer, presented a detailed staff report on proposed amendments to Fairbanks North Star Borough municipal animal-control code (Title 22) and the borough fine schedule. Assemblymember Leginas sponsored the ordinance.

Ross said the changes are not intended to introduce new prohibitions but to make code enforceable and proportional. She proposed removing a broad, subjective "barking/noise" provision because it "is incredibly subjective, ends up not serving the public" and is impractical to enforce without audiovisual proof. Instead, Ross said officers will handle prolonged-noise complaints in the humane-care enforcement framework when the animal may be in distress.

The draft ordinance would add a microchip requirement for animals placed in quarantine and allow officers discretion to permit home quarantine even when a rabies vaccine has lapsed for medical or welfare reasons (for example, a very old or postpartum animal). Ross said "microchips are free" and are needed to reliably identify animals if large-scale quarantine is required.

Staff proposed consolidating and revising fines to remove multi-stage graduated violative amounts that were ineffective in practice because court processing often prevents escalation. Examples in the presentation: quarantine for a biting animal would retain a 10-day quarantine period and a boarding cost of $20 per day (roughly $200), while failure to report an animal exhibiting signs of rabies or to surrender an animal for testing would carry higher fines (the staff recommendation cited sample amounts of $300 to $500 for more serious rabies-related failures). Ross emphasized that rabies is not currently endemic in interior Alaska but is present elsewhere in the state, so reporting and quarantine rules are important public-health tools.

Other proposed changes include expanding the rule about "intact" animals (applying confinement duties to intact males as well as females in heat), clarifying dangerous-animal procedures for animals labeled dangerous in other jurisdictions, and revising humane-care enforcement so that a required written warning is not an obstacle when an animal has already died or when enforcement targets organizations with rotating animals.

Assemblymembers asked for clarification about microchipping for animals that are disposed of under Department of Health directives and about how trap-line incidents and livestock-related releases are handled; Ross said disposal directives would follow DHSS instructions, and the code would require notification to animal control when domestic animals are injured or killed by third-party actions (for example, trapping). Ross said officers have worked with local trapping groups on education and suggested outreach to raise awareness of notification duties.

No vote was taken; staff said the changes are intended to improve practical enforcement and will proceed through the ordinance process.