Neighbors and dogs-What can I do??

What is the name of your state? NC

The people that own the house across the street from us asked us to keep an eye on their house when they rented it. The last time they rented it, it got messed up. When the new tenants came home with a 2nd dog, we called the owners and told them. The new tenants got busted and had to pay their original pet deposit which they hadn't. The neighbor got ticked off and went to several other neighbors soliciting them to call the police department and dog pound to complain and say that our dogs are out all hours of the day and night barking non-stop. The one neighbor told us that he came to his house and tried to give him a notebook to write things down in and tried to convince him to call. That neighbor also told us to be careful that he was out to get us fined because of the pet deposit. On Feb. 11th the police came and stated that several neighbors had called about the dogs. Our dogs have not been out since, we have purchased bark collars and are trying to get them use to them. However, he has in the mean time called the dog pound making a false report stating they were out barking. Is there anything I can do, I know the minute I put the dogs out he is going to call whether or not they bark

"Is there anything I can do, I know the minute I put the dogs out he is going to call whether or not they bark"
*** Your best action is to simply ignore him. The police will very quickly catch on that this guy is a crank and will either ignore his calls or STRONGLY suggest that this is a civil matter.
That is unless your dogs are really barking.

Yes, my dogs bark. But not constantly and not at 2 or 3 in the morning. My problem is that (quoted from the police officer that talked with us) "if they are called again we will be fined", and according to the police officer, they don't have to have any kind of proof that the dogs were barking. I know that it is not about the dogs because the one set of neighbors have lived there for a good 2- 2 1/2 years and have never said anything about the dogs and the one that has iniated all of it has been there since October or November and has never said anything about them. The kicker is they both have dogs that bark on and off.