If you are used to taking your dog outside for a walk, and for the purpose of tending to certain bodily process, your failure to pick up excretory byproducts could lead to an exorbitant fine ranging from about $800 to nearly $2,400. Such is the gist of a legislative proposal tendered in Costa Rica by the opposition party Social Christian Union (Spanish initials: PUSC).

If you are not familiar with PUSC, you are not alone. Like just about all political parties in Costa Rica, this one is in shambles, and its few followers are often critical of what they consider to be frivolous legislative proposals. However, legislators from PUSC insist that this measure to combat fecal matter accumulation on the public surfaces of Costa Rica is but a minor measure attached to a larger legislative intent.

According to political journalist Paula Ruiz of national newspaper La Prensa Libre, legislative proposal 19.461 seeks to ensure that animal abuse does not go unpunished in Costa Rica. Indeed, a criminal justice measure found in the proposal would result in a prison term between one and three years for humans in Costa Rica who are convicted of poisoning, torturing, mutilating, or otherwise hurting animals

Some of the measures included in the legislative proposal seek to control the malicious keeping of pets by unscrupulous residents of Costa Rica. For example, an individual who locks his or her cat or dog inside a vehicle during a hot summer day could face confiscation of all domestic animals and a prohibition from keeping pets in the future.

If the punitive and corrective measures seem to be harsh, it is important to note that in the legislative history of Costa Rica, many proposals tend to exaggerate their intent in the beginning for the purpose of catching the attention of the public. Once the project starts being deliberated at the Legislative Assembly, the measures tend to be negotiated and softened before passing and enacting. The problem with many of these proposals is that they hardly include a reasonable plan for implementation or enforcement, which results in confusion and abandonment once they are enacted.