Texas is home to one of the pet-friendliest places in America — but not all of its residents think that dogs should be everywhere.
A WalletHub report published in early August named Austin the 12th pet-friendly city in the United States, with specific praise for Texas’ capital city courtesy its health and wellness care access for animals and variety of outdoor recreation sites. It’s a culture Austin has leaned fully in on, particularly after a 2019 law passed by the Texas Legislature allowed restaurants to allow dogs in outdoor dining areas in specific scenarios.
That law, updating Texas’ Health and Safety Code, noted a food service establishment can allow dogs to accompany owners in an outdoor seating area under the following requirements:
- The establishment posts a sign in a visible area saying dogs are allowed
- The customer and dog access the permitted area “directly from the exterior of the establishment”
- The dog doesn’t enter the inside of the establishment
- The customer keeps the dog leashed and under control
- The customer doesn’t allow the dog to sit on a seat, table, countertop or similar area and the establishment doesn’t prepare food in that area or “permit open food other than food that is being served to a customer”
The exception for those rules is if the dog is a service animal, which is allowed inside establishments as a working medical assistant to the customer. Here in Texas, businesses like H-E-B and Buc-ee’s have specifically prohibited non-service animals from entering the premises, but are limited as to how they can investigate and ask whether an animal is actually a service animal and not a pet…