Clinton Township, MI Animal Ordinances: Pet Store Rules (2026)

22(b) of the township's animal ordinance flatly prohibits any pet store from selling, offering for sale, offering for adoption, trading, bartering, auctioning, giving away, delivering, or otherwise transferring or disposing of dogs, cats, rabbits, long-lived birds, or large reptiles. The same subsection extends the ban to any person or business offering those animals (plus ferrets) for sale or adoption on a roadside, public right-of-way, commercial parking lot, outdoor special sale, swap meet, flea market, or similar event, and bars off-site retail sales at any location other than where the animal was bred.

A pet store that does sell or transfer a live animal must first provide a Certificate of Origin, and knowingly presenting an inaccurate certificate is itself a violation. 22(a) carves out the one thing stores may still do: provide space and care for animals owned by an animal control shelter, animal protection shelter, nonprofit humane society, or nonprofit animal rescue agency, so the store can host adoptions for those animals. 22(c). 22(d), but cannot expand the scope or size of that operation. The ordinance was adopted as Ord. 484, passed February 27, 2023.