Rock Island County, IL Animal Ordinances: Pet Store Rules (2026)

County Code Sec. 004 requires any person, dog dealer, kennel operator, cattery operator, animal shelter, foster home, or pet shop operator that sells, adopts out, or fosters dogs or cats, or that keeps registries of dogs or cats, to cooperate with and supply information to the Administrator of County Animal Care and Control. The required data includes sales, adoptions, source of the animal, dispositions, number of litters produced, microchip numbers, and ownership records for each dog or cat. This section was adopted as part of the county's 2005 rewrite of the animal control chapter, Ordinance 2005-1116, and its stated purpose, per Sec.

002, is to protect residents from rabies, encourage responsible pet ownership, and give the county the data it needs to run its Animal Care and Control program and Pet Population Control Fund. The chapter's scope section, Sec. 003, ties this reporting duty to the county's broader vaccination, registration, and impoundment scheme: every dog or cat over four months old must be vaccinated and registered under Sec. 021, and a pet shop's sales records let the county cross-check that dogs and cats leaving its inventory are getting licensed.

Nothing in this chapter requires pet shops to source animals only from shelters or bars them from selling commercially bred animals; the code's only retail-sale-adjacent mandate is this recordkeeping and reporting obligation, enforced by the same Animal Care and Control office that collects license fees and redemption fees under Sec. 008.