County's warden team are top dogs for second year

Denbighshire County Council’s Dog Warden Team has been awarded the RSPCA’s gold footprint award for its work with stray dogs - for the second year running.

Denbighshire is the only local authority in Wales to achieve the gold standard for stray dogs and it was achieved through working in partnership with North Clwyd Animal Rescue.

The RSPCA introduced the Community Animal Welfare Footprint Awards in 2008 and the aim of the scheme is to recognise and promote those that have made an extra effort and gone beyond basic service requirements to ensure higher welfare standards in some of the service they provide.

This is the second time that the council has applied for the award and as a result of the award, Denbighshire County Council is now entitled for the next 12 months to use an accredited  logo on its website and publications.

The RSPCA CAWF scheme is split into four main categories – animal welfare principles, contingency planning, housing and stray dogs. Depending on the standards of the level of service, either: gold, silver or bronze footprints are awarded.

Since the schemes inception in 2008, the Stray Dog Footprint award has been the most popular, with achievers inspiring others to develop and improve their service.  The main aim of the Stray Dogs Footprint is to encourage local authorities to look at this important and often under-valued service and address any resource and issues that might help them to meet the footprint criteria in the future.

The scheme has been officially supported by the Chartered Institute of Environmental Health and the Trading Standards Institute.