Price County committee amends habitual animal offender ordinance and forwards it to full board

Larry Palecek, committee chairperson, presided over a May 7, 2026 meeting of the Price County Law Enforcement Committee where members amended and approved a change to Price County Ordinance Sec. 223-44.1, "Habitual Animal Offender," and voted to forward the amended ordinance to the Price County Board of Supervisors for consideration.

County Humane Officer Mindy Dabler presented the Dangerous Animal Ordinance and told the committee that the county has seen a rise in reported incidents involving dangerous animals, with multiple bite citations tied to owners at the same residence; the presentation was placed on file. A public hearing on the Habitual Animal Offender amendment drew public comments from Waldemar Madsen of Phillips and Ginny Strobl of the Town of Georgetown; the minutes record that both spoke about the proposed ordinance, but do not provide verbatim remarks.

During committee action, Dennis Wartgow moved and Robert Kopisch seconded an amendment to the draft ordinance that struck the word "may" on line 15 and replaced it with the word "shall" to change the ordinance's mandatory language; the committee adopted the amendment. On a subsequent motion by Wartgow, seconded by Kopisch, the committee approved the amended ordinance and forwarded it to the Price County Board of Supervisors for consideration. The minutes record the motions and that each motion "carried" but do not provide individual roll-call vote tallies.

The committee did not adopt a text in the minutes beyond the procedural amendment summarized above; the next step recorded in the minutes is transmission of the amended draft to the county board for its consideration.