Two separate cases making the rounds this week highlight a growing tension in the city between our famously relaxed attitude toward off-leash pups and the actual safety of the animals we claim to adore.

First, there's a mystery dog that's been spotted roaming freely between North Beach and Pier 39, apparently for weeks. The pup looks healthy and groomed, which has locals divided on whether it's genuinely lost or just living its best unleashed life. As one SF resident put it, the dog "looks pretty well fed and groomed so probably has an owner somewhere nearby who just lets him roam that area" — possibly a street vendor or performer who keeps their dog loose while they work.

Then there's Oreo, a visiting dog who got loose somewhere in the city. Oreo's owner is pleading with San Franciscans: do not chase him. He's friendly but scared, and he will bolt into traffic. He was last spotted near Berry and De Haro in Mission Bay.

These are two very different situations, but they share a common thread: the city's infrastructure for handling stray and lost animals is, charitably, not great. One local noted that SF Animal Care & Control "generally has a good idea of which animal is what" in the neighborhood — which is nice, but also suggests this is a frequent enough occurrence that they've built institutional knowledge around repeat offenders.

Here's the thing: letting your dog roam a tourist corridor unsupervised isn't quirky — it's a liability. And a city that spends enormous sums on various quality-of-life programs somehow still relies on word-of-mouth Reddit posts to reunite lost pets with their owners.

We're not asking for a surveillance state for golden retrievers. But functional animal control, enforced leash laws in high-traffic areas, and maybe a centralized lost-pet alert system that doesn't require scrolling through three subreddits? That doesn't seem like too much to ask from a city with a $14 billion budget.

If you spot Oreo, call Aidan at (669) 287-2245. Don't chase. Don't be a hero. Just make the call.