Licensing your dog in Franklin County

The duty, and where it comes from

Ohio Revised Code 955.02 requires every person who owns, keeps, or harbors a dog more than three months of age to file an application in the office of the county auditor of the county in which the dog is kept or harbored. The Franklin County Auditor restates it without qualification: all dogs older than three months of age must be licensed, no dog shall be harbored, kept, or owned without displaying a valid registration tag, and the law applies regardless of whether the dog is kept inside or out.

Columbus adds its own layer on top. Columbus City Code 2327.12 provides that no owner shall fail to register any dog pursuant to Revised Code Chapter 955, and that no owner of a dog shall fail to require the dog to wear, at all times, a valid tag issued in connection with a certificate of registration — a dog's failure at any time to wear a valid tag being prima facie evidence of a lack of registration. It is a minor misdemeanor and a strict liability offence.

The deadline, and a discrepancy worth knowing about

Follow the window the Auditor publishes: "Dog licenses must be renewed annually between December 1 and February 28, unless you purchase a three-year or permanent dog license (this is different than a three-year rabies tag)."

That is not the date in the statute. Ohio Revised Code 955.02 sets the window as on or after the first day of the applicable December but before the thirty-first day of the applicable January. The Auditor's own FAQ supplies the mechanism for the difference — the county commissioners may extend the deadline by county resolution — but the specific Franklin County resolution was not read for this guide. So this page cites the county's published window and attributes it to the Franklin County Auditor rather than to state law, and if the distinction ever matters to you, the office to ask is the Auditor's.

The late trigger is set out on the same page: after the renewal period of December 1 through February 28, a penalty is assessed for all dogs licensed that are older than three months of age and have been owned for more than 30 days. The penalty is the annual fee again.

What it costs

The Auditor's published schedule prices a spayed or neutered dog, or a dog meeting one of the exceptions below, at $18 for one year, $54 for three years, and $180 for a permanent licence. Without the discount those become $35, $105 and $350. The stated structure behind those numbers is that the base fee is $35 annually, a three-year tag is three times the annual fee, and a permanent licence is ten times the annual fee.

Bought late, the same licences cost $36, $72 and $198 with the discount, and $70, $140 and $385 without it — the on-time price plus the annual fee as a penalty. The Auditor also notes that after July 1 some fees may be prorated.

A replacement tag is $5, with a $1 card processing fee if you buy it online.

Who qualifies for the discount

The main route is spay or neuter. In the Auditor's words: "In order to address the overpopulation of dogs in Franklin County, licenses are discounted to $18 annually for dogs that are spayed or neutered."

Four exceptions reach the same price without it. A dog nine months old or younger qualifies, for one-year licences only. A dog advanced in years, or with a condition making spay or neuter impossible or inadvisable, qualifies on a veterinarian's signature. A dog being bred or intended to be bred for sale or show qualifies on a breed registry number or a veterinarian's signature. A dog intended for hunting qualifies on a hunting licence number or a veterinarian's signature.

Assistance dogs are handled separately and generously: complete the standard application and send it with proof of training from any nonprofit or for-profit special agency as required by Ohio Revised Code 955.011, and the registration is free and permanent.

The rabies tag requirement attached to the licence

The Auditor will not issue an effective tag without one. Its FAQ states, in its own capitals, that no dog license tag issued by the office shall be effective unless a current valid rabies tag number is included and the dog has a current valid rabies immunization, and that this applies to all dogs four months or older. Dogs younger than four months can be licensed without a rabies vaccination.

That four-month threshold is not the same as the three-month threshold in the Columbus and Franklin County health regulations that require vaccination in the first place. They are different rules in different instruments; there is a separate guide on this site about the vaccination requirement itself.

Where the money goes

The Auditor is specific about this, and it is the sort of thing worth knowing before you resent the fee: the licence fees collected, along with all fees collected at the Franklin County Dog Shelter and Adoption Center, go into a fund referred to as the Dog and Kennel Fund, which is designed to cover the cost of operating the shelter and for Animal Control to pick up stray dogs.

How to file

Online at doglicense.franklincountyohio.gov. In person at the public counter on the 21st floor of the Franklin County Auditor's office, Monday to Friday, 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. By post to the Franklin County Auditor, Dog License Section, 373 S. High St, 21st Floor, Columbus, OH 43215-6317.

The dog licence section's number is 614-525-3260. Found-dog reporting is a different number, 614-525-3400, staffed 24 hours.

This is not a business licence

The same Auditor's office issues a kennel licence, and it is a common mistake to read that as the licence a boarding kennel holds. It is not. The Auditor describes it as available for individuals or companies professionally breeding dogs for sale, and the statutory definition behind it is about breeding for a fee.

Nothing an owner files here licenses a grooming salon, a boarding kennel, a daycare or a trainer, because no such licence exists in Ohio at all. That is covered in its own guide.