The war between pet lovers and pet haters in Australia’s strata schemes has a new battleground – the communal swimming pool.
Actually, as a Flatchatter has written to tell us, it’s not so much a battle between those for and against companion animals, it’s between those residents – some of whom have pets themselves – who object to a neighbour who lets his pooch doggie-paddle in the pool.
‘Many of us take our dogs down to the poolside,’ says our correspondent, ‘but one owner has started taking his dog into the pool with him.
‘And now it’s turned really nasty with threats of defamation action over a note sent round to other owners saying how horrible the author thinks this practice is.’
The dog owner says he is doing nothing wrong – there is no by-law that specifically forbids dogs from swimming in the pool, so where’s the offence?
Meanwhile neighbours are scouring the by-laws looking for something that covers this fur-baby folly, but the best they can come up with is keeping dogs under control on common property.
The fear is that if they use that rule to keep the lapdog from doing laps, its owner will get revenge by insisting that all the other dogs are kept on a leash too.
What they need is a specific pool and pooch by-law. And until they get one, they could be barking up the wrong tree.
Do you think apartment residents should be allowed to take their pets into the pool, even if they are allowed on common property? Have your say here in the Forum.
This is now being discussed in the Flat Chat Forum