[HISTORY: Adopted by the Board of Health
of the Township of Oxford 12-30-1974 (Ch. 99 of the 1974 Township Code). Amendments noted where
applicable.]
GENERAL REFERENCES
Animals (Township Committee) – See Ch. 118.
As used in this chapter, the following terms
shall have the meanings indicated:
An animate being, excluding humans, which is endowed with
the power of voluntary motion.
No animal shall be permitted to run or range
in or upon the streets, public places or unfenced open fields within
the corporate limits of the Township. Such animals must be kept within
enclosures properly and adequately fenced, unless tied by line and
halter for grazing.
Rabbits, guinea pigs and similar animals or
fowl shall be kept confined in a suitable building or coop with an
enclosed and covered runway.
No chicken coop shall be erected, maintained
or kept nearer than 50 feet to any dwelling house, residence or place
in which persons live, and all such places shall be kept in a sanitary
condition so that the same shall not be an annoyance or injurious
to the public health and subject to such reasonable regulations as
the Board of Health may deem necessary for the preservation of the
public health and safety.
No person shall keep, harbor or maintain any
domestic animals or fowl on any premises within the corporate limits
of the Township in any manner which will cause unsanitary, insalubrious
or offensive conditions to arise therefrom, nor shall any person harbor
any animal or vermin whose natural actions and presence are or may
be deleterious or harmful to the public health.
It shall be unlawful for any person to cruelly
beat, torture, maltreat or abuse any animal or fowl within the limits
of the Township, whether such animal or fowl belongs to himself or
to another person.
No animals infected with a communicable disease
dangerous to the public health and animals within the Township shall
be brought to or kept within the limits of the Township except by
permission of the Board of Health, and the bodies of animals dead
of such disease or killed on account thereof shall not be buried within
500 feet of any residence nor be disposed of otherwise than as the
Board of Health or its Health Officer shall direct.
Every veterinary physician or surgeon and every
person practicing as such and every person owning or having animals
in his care within the Township shall present to the Health Officer
a written notice of the existence of any and every case of tuberculosis,
glanders or farcy or other contagious or infectious diseases of animals
which may have come under his observation or to his knowledge, which
notice shall be given within two days thereafter and shall contain
the name and residence of the possessor of the animal so diseased
so far as the same can be ascertained, a description of the animal
and when last seen by the person giving the notice, and be signed
by him, and any owner, possessor of or person harboring such affected
animal shall immediately dispose of such animal upon order of the
Health Officer and in such manner that the same will not be dangerous
or injurious to the public health.
