From now on, owners of dangerous dogs who move into the city of Auburn with the animals will have more than a day to register them.

But thanks to an amendment the City Council passed Monday to the Dangerous Dog Ordinance, those owners will pay $500 a year to register their dog, a $400 increase. The amendment also lays out in detail what constitutes a proper dangerous dog enclosure.

“We have eliminated the particular statement that the dangerous dogs had to be reported on the first day that people brought them to the community,” said Councilmember Gene Cerino, chairman of the Municipal Services Committee, adding that the revision allows owners up to 10 days to register the dog.

Owners who fail to comply with the 10-day rule could face confiscation of their dogs. Failure to secure liability insurance and failure to keep the dog in a proper enclosure or muzzled and restrained when outside of one also could result in confiscation.

Distinct from potentially dangerous dogs, dangerous indicates an animal that the law in another jurisdiction already has declared dangerous for reasons that include the following:

• It has killed or inflicted severe injury on a human being without provocation on public or private property.

• It has killed or inflicted serious injury on a domestic animal without provocation while the dog was off the owner’s property.

• It has been previously found to be potentially dangerous because of injury inflicted on a human, the owner having received notice of such and the dog again aggressively bites, attacks or endangers the safety of humans.

At the moment, there are no known dangerous dogs in the city.

Under the old ordinance, a dog already determined dangerous elsewhere moving into the city would have been considered only potentially dangerous.

A proper enclosure, according to the amended ordinance, must have a concrete floor or secure fencing material buried not less than one foot below the surface. If the animal control authority deems the enclosure inadequate or improper, that fact must be communicated in writing to the owner so that the owner knows what the deficiencies are and how to correct them. Decisions may be appealed to the chief of police of his designee.

An owner may appeal the authority’s final determination that the dog is dangerous to the City’s Hearing Examiner.

Councilmember Lynn Norman objected to the fee increase, arguing that it would discourage owners of dangerous dogs from registering them.

“I think that if it’s $500, people are going to try and avoid it,” Norman said. “I realize that if they’re caught they will be paying a lot more money than that. But I would rather know where these dangerous dogs are and actually have them registered than possibly have their owners avoiding that fee.”

Cerino said that most other cities simply ban dangerous dogs altogether.

“Our ordinance allows you to keep your dog, if you love him that much, by paying a $500-a-year fee and building an adequate containment area,” Cerino said. “If they don’t want to pay the $500 fee, personally I would say let’s go for banning of the dog because I don’t want a dangerous dog inside city limits if people aren’t really serious about the way they are going to take care of it.”

Couuncilmember Virginia Haugen suggested lowering the fee to $250.

“I know people out in the community … that don’t have dangerous dogs that have had to deal with dogs like this, and they are going to agree … the fee is very high, and people are going to try and hide their dogs,” Haugen said.

“I would opt for lowering the fee as well, because if they are betting the $500 against $1,000, most of these folks would not get the license,” said Rich Wagner. He did not suggest how low the fee should be.

Councilmembers adopted the changes with the $500 fee intact.

Failing to comply with the ordinance is a misdemeanor that could result in a $1,000 fine and 90 days in jail or both, said City Attorney Dan Heid.