Hackensack, NJ Noise Ordinances: Barking Dogs (2026)

Section 112-9G of the noise chapter makes it unlawful for a property owner or tenant to allow a domesticated or caged animal to create a sound across a real property line that unreasonably disturbs or interferes with a resident's peace, comfort and repose, and it separately penalizes refusing or intentionally failing to stop the noise once a Noise Control Officer or Investigator has ordered it stopped. Rather than leaving "unreasonable" to guesswork, the section spells out prima facie evidence of a violation in two ways.

Continuous vocalizing, howling, yelping, barking or squawking, for five minutes without interruption, defined as averaging four or more vocalizations per minute across that period, is enough on its own. So is intermittent vocalizing for twenty minutes, defined as averaging two or more vocalizations per minute across that period. Either threshold shifts the burden onto the animal's owner or tenant once it is documented, typically by a Noise Control Officer or Investigator listening at the property line. The chapter builds in one affirmative defense: it is a defense under § 112-9G that the dog or other animal was intentionally provoked into barking or making the noise, which puts the burden on showing the animal was reacting on its own rather than being deliberately set off by someone else.

Because § 112-9G sits inside the general noise chapter rather than the Animals chapter (Ch. 52), enforcement runs through the noise chapter's Noise Control Officers and Investigators and its penalty structure in § 112-11, not through Animal Control.