Unseen Fences Upset the Unsuspecting

Chevy Chase Enclave Might Regulate Electronic Pet Barriers

To some suburbanites, good fences don't make such good neighbors when you can't see them.

That's the issue facing the Town Council of Somerset, an incorporated enclave within Chevy Chase, which will consider next month regulating the placement of invisible electronic dog fences. The devices confine pets to their home turf with a low-wattage cable buried along the perimeter of a yard.

The proposal would require setbacks of at least three feet from sidewalks and 14 feet from curbs without sidewalks.

With several houses adding the systems in recent months, town leaders want to make sure that unknowing pedestrians aren't upset, or upended, by the sight of dogs charging toward them with no visible means of restraint.

The community is just one of several in the country that have taken regulatory notice of the systems, which are becoming more common in tightly packed suburban neighborhoods. Albuquerque, for example, has banned them, and Louisville allows them only for dogs that have been spayed or neutered.

"We've got a number of them in the town now," said Somerset's longtime mayor, Walter Behr. "On most of our streets, we only have sidewalks on one side, and you can't avoid these yards unless you walk in the street. It can be frightening if the dogs are too close."

It was frightening for Somerset resident Alison Fortier, who was walking her Labrador retriever along Dorset Avenue last year when two barking dogs suddenly came running from behind a nearby house. With no owner, chain or fence in sight, the animals charged toward Fortier with, as far as she could see, nothing to stop them.

The dogs pulled up short, right at the edge of the sidewalk, Fortier said. But not before sparking a barking lunge from her lab that nearly pulled Fortier off her feet.

"I could have broken something," Fortier said. "I found it very unsettling. For somebody who's older, or a child, it can be very scary if you don't know they are going to stop."

Owners say the systems are more affordable and visually cleaner than chain-link or masonry, not to mention easier to mow around. They are particularly popular in neighborhoods where traditional fences are forbidden by zoning or home association rules.

Sally Shea, another Somerset resident, said she and her husband chose an electronic fence recently because it maintained the open feel of their corner lot, didn't require a building permit and was easier to have installed than a solid barrier.

"It seemed like a speedier solution for our house," Shea said.