Fairfield couple raises concerns about vicious dog enforcement

FAIRFIELD – A Fairfield couple appeared before the City Council on Aug. 27 to bring attention to a case involving their daughter, who needed stitches after being bitten by a dog a few weeks prior.

Rachel Brower, joined by her husband Tommy in the audience, said she was concerned that not enough was being done to protect residents from dangerous dogs in light of the information she uncovered about the dog that bit their 11-year-old daughter, Bixie. On Aug. 12, Bixie was at a friend’s birthday party at East Broadway Avenue and North D Street. While the group of kids was playing outside, a neighbor’s dog managed to escape through a fence and bite Bixie, causing multiple puncture wounds, severe injuries and forcing her to get seven stitches after a trip to the emergency room.

Rachel said she wanted to bring this incident to the attention of the council because it was not the first time that dog had attacked someone. She said two other people had reported dangerous encounters with the dog going back to 2022. She said that the city’s code prohibits keeping vicious animals within city limits, which includes animals that have exhibited vicious tendencies such as attacking, biting, attempting to bite, or belligerently pursuing a person.

“It’s deeply troubling that despite a documented history of aggression, this dog was not restrained to prevent the attack on my daughter,” Rachel said. “The fact that it wasn’t raises questions about how these regulations are being enforced.”

Rachel urged the council to hold dog owners accountable for failing to confine their dogs, and to swiftly remove any animals that pose a clear threat to public safety.

In an interview with The Southeast Iowa Union on Sept. 6, Fairfield Police Chief David Thomas and Officer Glenn Hackbarth said the police had served a notice to the dog’s owner, Michael Eugene Davidson II, 51, of Fairfield, that he had to remove the dog from the city limits because it qualified as a vicious animal, having been involved in at least two attacks on a human or other animal. He was given 14 days to respond to the notice, which he could appeal to the city’s Animal Control Review Board. If no appeal is filed, and if the police find the dog on the premises at the end of the time period in violation of the order, then police will take the dog and put it down, Hackbarth said.

Thomas said that dog bites are rare, and that the police are called to them only a couple of times per year. He said state law requires the police to investigate all dog bites, including to the owner, and to coordinate with Jefferson County Public Health to find out if the dog is up to date on its rabies vaccine. Hackbarth said that, to his knowledge, in this case involving Bixie Brower, the dog was not up to date on its rabies vaccine.

Rachel and Tommy Brower told The Union in an interview after the council meeting that their daughter not only suffered physically from the dog bite but also psychologically. They worry that it will prevent her from developing a love of dogs.

“It was traumatic,” Tommy said.

“Bixie is an extremely empathetic and caring child, and it’s heartbreaking because this is a piece of innocence shattered that you can’t get back,” Rachel said.

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Call Andy Hallman at 641-575-0135 or email him at andy.hallman@southeastiowaunion.com