Despite announcing they will be tough on residents and visitors to the Borough who fail to clean up after their dog, the Council issued just 19 Fixed Penalty Notices for dog fouling in the past three and a half years.
Figures obtained via a Freedom of Information Request, revealed that so far in 2016 just 5 Fixed Penalty Notices for dog fouling have been issued across the whole borough.
Whilst the total issued across Cheshire East for the previous three years (2013-2015) was just 14.
Cheshire East Council has six community wardens who they say visit Wilmslow, Handforth and Alderley Edge three to four times a week. However, in Wilmslow one FPN was issued in 2013, three in 2014, one in 2015 and none so far this year.
Whilst in Alderley Edge and Handforth no fines for dog fouling have been served in this time.
In the past three and a half years the Council has sent five files to their legal team regarding dog fouling owners of which two were successful in court prosecutions.
A Council spokesperson said "We are currently undertaking a number of campaigns in our borough called "Dog Watch" with an aim to promote the reporting of any witnessed incidents dog fouling and also to encourage dog owners to behaviour in a responsible manner when out and about with their dogs.
"We recognise that the majority of our dog owners behave in a responsible manner, but there are a minority who ruin this for others and do not pick up their dogs mess, leaving not only a unsightly mess but also cause a major health risk to others visiting the area.
"Part of our campaign is to make sure our residents and visitors to our area are aware of how to report dog fouling and also encourage them to do so. As well as engaging local communities to keep a sustainable message out there when are officers are not around. Our officers regularly patrol our hotspot areas, but often are not there when this behaviour takes place, so we rely on members of the community to assist us with this."
Comments
Here's what readers have had to say so far. Why not add your thoughts below.
So now we know, two Community Wardens cover the 'north'/former Macclesfield Borough area and they manage to visit AE/Wilmslow/Handforth 3-4 times/week (that is probably Monday-Friday, maybe Saturday) - do they really.
What exactly is it they do when they are in town (I guess there are community duties other than just sleuthing out dog fouling) so they must either be really fit saturating the area with patrolling 'strategic' zones on foot, or like the majority of our bobbies, they manage a splash and dash in the company vehicle - fat lot of good that does!
In the final analysis, as usual, it's up to Joe citizen in these sort of instances to catch/record ('photos are often required to get the ball rolling)/research (you need an address..) and then report to the authorities. After all that - 14 FPN in the WHOLE of CE in the past 3 years, 5 of which were in Wilmslow and nil in 2016; AE and Handforth apparently don't have a problem since nil FPN's in 3 1/2 years and - we don't know if those FPN's were issued as a result of citizen action or just down to our active, vigilant Community Wardens….
If these jobs were results driven then we could easily justify saving the county (and ourselves) circa +£100K plus vehicles/running costs etc. The maximum fine for fouling (and I believe it is usually only after repeated offending) is £1000 so the county has derived £14K contribution over 3 1/2 years - I don't think, cost to prosecute alone will be more than £14K!!!
Educate/prevent, catch and prosecute, HARD otherwise it's just a useless exercise….
….and now we know some more about what we get from CE for our rates.
An initial response from Ansa and CE Cllr, but nothing since. Been months now. Guess they aren't interested in doing this cheaply. Still, just look at the state of our pavements and is it any wonder?
We regularly walk our Hearing Dog puppy in training and do see excreta left. Plenty of responsible dog walkers clear up, but clearly some do not. Never ever seen a poo warden and we are out 2x or 3x daily in parks and in town.
What do they look like?
WTC given the money, would sort this out far more effectively. CARPE DIEM!