Talented dog takes bigger bite

Albany raises adoption price for strays as part of $459,000 in fee hikes

By TIM O'BRIEN, Staff writer
Wednesday, May 21, 2008, Times Union

ALBANY -- It's going to cost more to adopt a talented dog.
The Common Council raised 80 different fees this week, on everything from building code violations to handbilling to marriage licenses. One particularly eye-catching fee was the price for adopting a seized dog.

That price will rise from $50 to $65 for "talented dogs" and from $10 to $15 for "other dogs," according to the city's list of fees.

City Clerk John Marsolais offered a joking definition of a "talented dog."

"It's one that doesn't eat your homework," he said.

But Marsolais said the term actually refers to dogs of particular breeds that are swiftly adopted, rather than an average, less costly mutt.

Common Council member Dominick Calsolaro was upset about one of the fee increases. The council raised the price for failure to remove graffiti from $10 to $100 a day.

"These people have a criminal act against them," he said. "They are not responsible for what happened to them. A lot of the homes that have graffiti have elderly homeowners."

Failing to remove graffiti isn't the only misbehavior that could lead to bigger fines.

The fine for destruction of park grounds will rise from $10 to an amount not to exceed $250. Wrecking grass and shrubbery will jump from $5 to no more than $250.

The penalty for littering or defacing sidewalks will rise from a range of $10 to $50 to a spread of $50 to $250.

One fee unlikely to generate much more in the cell-phone era: the cost for installing public pay phones will rise from $250 to $325.

The cost of distributing handbills will also go up. People who hand out fliers for a period of a week or less will see the fee rise from $11 to $25. If you're planning to pass out handbills over a period of nine months to a year, the fee will increase from $110 to $150.

A marriage license will cost $35, up $10. A marriage certificate will add $15, up from $10. Domestic partners aren't spared: A certificate will rise in price from $25 to $35.

Christopher Hearley, city budget director, said most fees rose 25 percent. The increases are estimated to generate an additional $459,000 in this year's budget.

"As we were preparing the 2008 budget, we were looking at various revenue sources we could affect rather than just property taxes," Hearley said. "A lot of these fees have not been raised in years."

Tim O'Brien can be reached at 454-5092 or by e-mail at tobrien@timesunion.com.