Albany, NY Animal Ordinances: Breed Restrictions (2026)

What Albany does regulate is dangerous behavior. City Code Chapter 99 (Dogs and Other Animals) requires every dog over four months old to be licensed and on a six-foot leash off the owner's property, and incorporates the state's dangerous-dog adjudication framework. Under Ag & Markets §123, a victim, witness, dog-control officer, or police officer can file a sworn complaint with the Albany City Court alleging that a specific dog is dangerous. The court then holds a hearing where the dog's actual conduct — past bites, unprovoked attacks on people or other pets, threatening behavior — is the only relevant question; the dog's breed is legally immaterial. If the court adjudicates the dog dangerous, it can order any combination of secure confinement, muzzling when off premises, microchipping, mandatory spay/neuter, mandatory training, owner liability insurance up to $100,000, and, in the most serious cases involving unprovoked attacks causing serious injury or death, humane euthanasia. Landlords and homeowner-insurance carriers can impose private breed restrictions on tenants or policyholders — those are contractual matters and are not affected by §107(5).