Mountain View, CA Animal Ordinances: Dog Leash Laws (2026)

Sec. 50 sets the city's baseline leash rule: physical restraint on a leash of no more than six feet, or confinement behind a fence tall enough to hold the dog in, with five listed exceptions for service animals, trial and exhibition dogs, hunting and herding dogs, registered private-patrol or police dogs, and dogs being trained for those same purposes on private land with the landowner's permission. Sec. 4 limits how officers can act on a leash violation: an animal control officer may not seize or impound a dog that has never left, or has since returned to, the owner's own property, though a citation can still issue, and if the officer cannot find the owner on a stray-then-returned dog, the dog may be impounded with a written notice posted at the property.

Posted off-leash areas suspend Sec. 50 only if every Sec. 61 condition is met: handlers must be at least 13 years old, no more than two dogs per person, dogs must be at least four months old, currently licensed, and rabies-vaccinated, and any waste must be picked up immediately with a leash carried and physically held once the dog leaves the off-leash area. Sec. 11 separately makes it a public nuisance for any animal, leashed or not, to chase vehicles, repeatedly run at large, or run at large while in heat, and lets any private person specially injured sue to enforce that nuisance declaration under California Civil Code Sec. 3493.