Council Bluffs, IA Animal Ordinances: Dog Leash Laws (2026)

CBMC 4.20.050 puts the restraint duty on the owner directly and at all times, not just when the animal is loose on someone else's property, so an unleashed dog in a Council Bluffs yard without a fence or tether is already out of compliance if it can leave the property. Violating the restraint duty is a simple misdemeanor under CBMC 8.02.020, and the administrative authority seizes and impounds any animal actually found running at large. Cats get a partial carve-out: an owner whose cat wears a current rabies tag and license only has to restrain it enough to prevent property damage, and a compliant cat found at large is impounded only at the administrative authority's discretion rather than automatically.

If animal control can't catch the loose animal, or the owner won't hand it over, the owner instead gets a ticket for the enforcement and impound fee set in the city's schedule of fees. Anyone who finds a stray may legally hold it, but must notify animal control within forty-eight hours and cannot claim ownership until a thirty-day custody period passes without an owner surfacing, subject to Iowa Code Sections 351.25 and 351.27. To redeem an impounded animal, the owner must prove ownership, pay the board, keep and impound fees, present or purchase a current city license backed by proof of rabies vaccination, and have the animal microchipped at the owner's expense before release. Unclaimed animals become city property after the impoundment period runs.