Lower Paxton, PA Noise Ordinances: Barking Dogs (2026)

Section 68-3, Animals disturbing the peace, is the township's barking dog rule. It sits in Chapter 68 of the Lower Paxton Township Code, adopted by the Board of Supervisors, and it applies to every dog and other domestic animal that a person owns or has under his control. It also reaches any nondomesticated animal confined on that person's premises, so a caged or penned wild animal is covered by the same sentence as a household dog.

The test is the effect on neighbors, not a measured number. The section prints no decibel limit, no minimum duration and no quiet hours. The animal must make a loud or harsh noise or disturbance that interferes with or deprives the peace, quiet, rest or sleep of any person within the Township. A complaint therefore turns on whether the noise intruded on someone's rest, which can be as true at midday as at night.

The responsible person is the one who allows the noise: the owner, or whoever has the animal under his control, or the person on whose premises a nondomesticated animal is confined. Chapter 131, the Lower Paxton Township Noise Ordinance adopted 3-10-2020 as Ord. No. 20-02, is a separate chapter that limits sound generated by a principal or accessory use or its operations or activities on its lot by sound level and receiving district. The animal rule in § 68-3 is its own test and does not depend on a sound reading.

Section 68-6 gives enforcement to any Township police officer or Code Enforcement Officer as assigned by the Township, and § 68-7 sets the penalty for the whole chapter. Because § 68-7 reaches any person, firm or corporation that permits a violation, the owner answers for the animal's noise even when someone else was watching it.