Denver breed-restricted dogs need the city permit path

Denver once banned pit bull-type dogs outright. The city traded that ban for a permit, so the dogs are now legal here, but only with a Breed-Restricted Permit in hand. The permit is the part that still trips people up.

The process does not start with paperwork. It starts with a breed evaluation by Denver Animal Protection, which looks at the dog and decides whether it counts as a restricted breed and therefore needs the permit at all. Your own read on the dog’s breed, or what the shelter or breeder called it, is not the official answer. The evaluation is.

Sort this out before you move into Denver with a dog, adopt one here, or take in a relative’s pet. A regular pet license, the one every dog in the city needs, does not settle the breed-restricted question on its own. A dog can be fully licensed and still be missing the permit it specifically requires, and finding that out after the fact is the hard way to learn it.

If there is any chance your dog reads as a pit bull type, treat the evaluation as the first step rather than an afterthought. Denver Animal Shelter’s breed-restricted permit page lays out the current process, where the evaluation happens, and the rest of the animal-protection rules that come with owning one of these dogs in the city.