Delaware County, PA Animal Ordinances: Dog Leash Laws (2026)

Section 141-3N bars any animal an owner or handler controls from being in a county park area, with two exceptions: a dog in a permitted area, restrained by a leash not exceeding six feet, or an animal state law separately allows. Owners must clean up after their animals, and the code requires that feces be disposed of in a sanitary manner. Dog training of any kind is not permitted in county parks. A dog running off leash outside a designated dog park can be seized and disposed of under whatever law or ordinance governs stray animals on the highway or public property where the animal is found, meaning county or municipal animal-control procedures, not a park-specific pound.

The one broad carve-out is for areas the Parks and Recreation Department has publicly designated as dog parks, where dogs may run off leash. This sits inside the same Chapter 141, Ord. No. 2023-2, readopted February 1, 2023, that regulates every other conduct rule in county parks, and it is enforced by county park police alongside the rest of §141-3's list, which also bars horses except on designated paths (§141-3K) and the display of zoo-type animals (§141-3U(3)). Because the leash rule is a park regulation, it applies specifically to Delaware County-owned parks such as Rose Tree, Glen Providence, Upland, Smedley and Ridley Creek, not to sidewalks or private property, which are instead governed by each municipality's own animal-control ordinance.