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<DIV>What a nerve they have!We had some wacko neighbors too once (oh boy were we
all in the neighborhood glad when they moved away!) and it sure sounds
awful that you have several complainers all in a row there.</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>I tried bringing dog treets and reason.It was good to do that with
everybody in the neighborhood because I ended up having a few of the neighbors
KNOW US and therefor would not "turn us in" when the Nut job family filed their
reports with Animal Control and the Police! </DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>I tried telling our neighbors in a respectful way that it is our right to
have our dogs walking. Showed them the poop bags attached to their leads and
showed how they were QUIET. I invited them over for lattes and served some
good food. (like our dogs I have found FUDE to be a grreat motivator! lol)
Being reasonable and respectful is sometimes tough to do especially when you are
dealing with bizarre nut jobs who swear and yell. Maybe is you have a
neighborhood BBQ or something..a coffee klatch...something friendly they could
learn to get along better?</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>Swearing does serve a purpose...usually when we have reached our
LIMITS and blow our tops...the swearing is a sort of release right? Well you do
not know WHAT is motivating these people! Maybe when they are calmed down you
could talk with them or perhaps talk with your neighbors who do love your
Bassets and find out what is going on. Sometimes you find out amazing
things about what people are really yelling about and understanding them can
help you better decide what to do next. </DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>Like somebody said maybe they are worried about THEIR DOGS BEING OUT OF
CONTROL and it really has not much to do with you or your dogs really. You
have every right to walk by whenever and how many times you please. This is
after all a free country. Here's One thing I tried and it worked for a neighbor
we have now. We are at least on saying "Hi" terms and smiling:</DIV>
<DIV> When
we have to go by our noisy yappy doggie neighbors I just got permission to give
em some little treets... talked with them about it awhile when we all had
coffees and sweet rolls one weekend morning at our house...and nowadays
over time when they are quiet now they get a handful of broken up treets tossed
out in their yard...nowadays they come running up and "sit pretty" and are
eagerly waiting the treets that will be tossed as a reward for the sitting
pretty and not yapping like maniacs. This took some time...but now my
terrier-est neighbors are more livable for their neighbors as well as us walkers
by. They need to TRAIN their dogs...maybe you can help them?</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>Maybe you could copy out the DD's people sent to you and ask them to read
them? OR...just write them a short respectful letter. You do NOT need to bother
with them though. If they overstep their bounds and yell again then I would call
the POLICE. BE SURE that you get a CASE NUMBER. If they do not give you a
CASENUMBER then it is not on the record. You need it to be on the record. You
need to keep track somewhere on a calendar or something the times and dates. You
will need this at your "Arbitration" or education session that the Animal
Control and Police will have with you and your neighbors. Be SURE you are always
respectful and be sure you always record the times and dates.</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV> You sure do have every right to walk after all its the right thing to
do for our hounds! Exercise is a good thing! They ought to be GLAD for your
walking 3 times a day...when people walk in any neighborhood then EVERYBODY is
safer. What is wrong with these people I wonder?</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>We had neighbors who tried to get the people in the neighborhood to turn us
in for barking and howling Hounds! They would call us and say our dogs
were barking and we would look around and all our dogs would be snoozing
away...and some OTHER dogs would be barking.</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>They would call the police....and the police would come so of course all
the dogs would bark at the cop car in the driveway. The cop helped us alot. He
said we ought to go to "arbitration". So we did.</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>We found out there that in our state we can have our dogs barking and we
can make NOISE from 8 AM till dusk or 9 PM I think it was. Each state
should have a noise meter that reads the level of noise and if it is
over a certain level and for over 5 or 6 minutes at a time THEN you could be
dragged into "Arbitration". In our state they do not even really HAVE this
"meter" to measure the noise level. At our meetings with the police and the
Animal Control we were so scared that the neighbors might harm our animals
(horses and cats and dogs...) and we got just fed up with the complaining
neighbors. We were so happy to have the Animal Control people come and do some
EDUCATION of the awful neighbors we once had. We had been just about ready to
MOVE..because we could not stand the fear that the nut heads would keep
complaining. It does have way of driving up your blood pressure. We know
some people who had to spend $13 thousand dollars soundproofing their home so
that the dogs barking and carrying on when they were not home could be muffled
and made less noisy. We didn't have that kind of money and so we were worried
about the whole thing...you know when Rescue Dogs come into rescue they often DO
Bark and after all...dogs do BARK! lol</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>So...maybe you might try and get your friendly neighbors together and then
contact your Animal Control and make an appointment for them to come out and
witness what happens and HELP YOU. That is their job. You are paying their
paycheck with your taxes! They are so often overworked and stressed out
having so much to do in each day but there should be an animal control officer
WHO will be able to come out and help you. If the nut job neighbors find that
Animal Control is backed by POLICE and that you have every right to walk your
dogs on the public street... I bet they will think twice about harassing you
continually as they have done.</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>We found that the Police and the Animal Control people were really in truly
a LOT of HELP. Our other neighbors were glad for the fact that we had stood up
to the ornery neighbors. We found out that other neighbors were being harassed
too (they said that our neighbors across the streets sheep and cows SMELLED
badd) I think that if you can keep walking you ought to but you are the only one
who can make the decision as to if it is safe or not. Good Luck!</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>Sincerely, Lexa Mom to Hudson and Henry</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>You can't fool all of the people all of the time, but politicians figure
that once every 4 years is good enough!</DIV></FONT><BR><BR><BR><DIV><FONT style="color: black; font: normal 10pt ARIAL, SAN-SERIF;"><HR style="MARGIN-TOP: 10px">Wondering what's for Dinner Tonight? <A title="http://food.aol.com/dinner-tonight?NCID=aolfod00030000000001" href="http://food.aol.com/dinner-tonight?NCID=aolfod00030000000001" target="_blank">Get new twists on family favorites at AOL Food</A>.</FONT></DIV></BODY></HTML>