Las Cruces, NM Animal Ordinances: Pet Store Rules (2026)

Sec. 7-16(f), enacted with the city's 2025 animal control rewrite (Ord. No. 3091), tells pet stores flatly that no pet store may sell, offer for sale, barter, auction, give away, or otherwise transfer ownership or guardianship of a dog or cat. The ban covers every method of transfer, not just a cash sale, so a store cannot give away a dog or cat as a promotion either. The same section carves out a narrow lane for stores that want to keep working with animals: Sec.

7-16(f) lets a pet store partner with a registered 501(c)(3) rescue to help place rescue dogs and cats, and Sec. 7-16(g) separately allows a store to host adoption showcases for animal shelters, 501(c)(3) rescues and animal control authorities inside the store. The rule sits inside a broader Sec. 7-16 sale-and-transfer chapter that also bars selling any companion animal under eight weeks old, selling animals on a public street, sidewalk or park, offering an animal as a contest prize outside an FFA or 4-H event, and selling venomous animals other than aquarium fish.

A separate breeding-permit system under Sec. 7-31(10) still lets individual breeders sell puppies and kittens directly, since the pet-store ban targets retail storefronts, not licensed home breeders, who must display a valid breeding permit number in any advertisement and furnish it to a buyer on request.