Laguna Niguel, CA Noise Ordinances: Barking Dogs (2026)

Section 10-1-48(a) makes it unlawful for a person owning, occupying or controlling a property to allow any animal on that property to cause a public nuisance, defining a public nuisance to include, but not limit to, disruptive sounds from barking, howling, crying, neighing or braying that unreasonably disturb a person's reasonable and comfortable enjoyment of life or property. Subsection (b) carves out a defense: a dog is not a public nuisance if it is making noise because a person is trespassing on the property where the dog is kept, or because the dog is being teased, provoked, or is protecting a person or property.

Cross-referenced against the city's separate noise control chapter at Section 6-6-1 et seq., this section gives animal services its own complaint-driven process under Section 10-1-52 rather than routing barking complaints through the general noise ordinance. That process requires a warning letter on the first substantiated complaint, a notice to comply delivered in person by an animal control officer on a second complaint filed at least ten but no more than 30 days later, and a formal witness statement corroborated by two additional independent witnesses before a third complaint results in an administrative citation.

Section 10-1-53 sets the resulting fine schedule at $100 for a first citation, $200 for a second citation within 12 months, and $500 for a third and every citation after that, with at least ten days required between citations to the same person, and any fine unpaid after 15 days doubling as a late penalty.