I walk past this sign every time I take my daughter to school. It irritates me every time. Am I allowed to walk dogs, but only if I'm not doing it in the interests of health and hygiene? Or does it mean that they consider dog walking unhygienic? The ambiguity is annoying: this is in a school, dammit, what kind of lesson does this provide the children?
Yours, pedant-of-Coton
The sign means that people in the area have shown they can't be trusted to clean up after their dogs.
There was a letter in The Times a couple of years or so ago, which read:
Stern resistance to the apostrophe is on view at a high-rise block in Birmingham, where a notice reads: "Residents refuse to be placed in chutes."
Colin Hardwick, Wombourne
And another letter to The Times at around the same time read:
Sir,
The manager of our local supermarket has the lowest possible opinion of us.
A notice appears periodically saying "You're toilets."
Ross Williams,
Hereford.
Dave
Oh, please. It's not in the least ambiguous unless you are entirely incapable of contextual analysis.