Ordinance imposes fines for feeding bears

Responding to complaints from residents who claim to have seen neighbors feeding black bears, the Northampton City Council on July 12 approved an ordinance that makes the practice subject to fines of $100 or more.

The ordinance may be the first of its kind in Massachusetts. Tom O’Shea, assistant director of the Division of Fisheries and Wildlife, said that while a number of communities have banned the feeding of geese and other waterfowl, he is not aware of instances where the feeding of bears has been banned.

Northampton, according to city officials, has an unusually high number of bears within its roughly 35 square miles. The animals are often seen close to the city center, thanks to adjoining conservation lands, said Daniel Wasiuk, the town’s interim health director.

The Health Department helped draft the ordinance, which also sets forth conditions for the proper storage of trash. If bears or other wild animals gain access to trash containers, the resident must remove the trash, or remedy the problem, within 48 hours.

The feeding of bears will bring a $100 fine for a first offense, $200 for a second offense, and $300 for all subsequent offenses. Among possible enforcing officers are local police, Board of Health agents, and state Environmental Police officers.

Wasiuk said that in the past, the city’s animal-control efforts focused more on avoiding the destruction of property or attacks on pets. But, he said, the number of residents who were providing food to the bears required a new approach.

“Some of them really had the bears programmed to a feeding schedule,” Wasiuk said.