Debate on dog park goes on

Staff

Published Friday, October 10, 2008

Resistance to locating a public dog park in southwest Austin has surfaced.

At Monday night’s regular meeting of the Austin City Council, Linda Grover, housing director for St. Mark’s Lutheran Home Apartments, read a letter to the Council Members expressing concerns.

According to Grover, St. Mark’s apartment-dwellers already see pet owners exercise their animals in the vacant lot north of the facility and “They don’t clean up after their dogs.”

The city’s Parks, Recreation and Forestry Department has scaled back plans for a dog park in the area between the city’s wastewater treatment plant at St. Mark’s Lutheran Home. It is now a two-acre fenced site divided for large and small animals. The site was moved to the southwest area from the Northeast Industrial Park where it was originally scheduled to be located.

Dog-owners have argued before the Park Board that they need a dog park to exercise their animals and to allow them to socialize with other pets. Having a dog park would also relieve the problem of dog-owners using public areas such as parks and neighborhood lots for exercising their animals. An informal organization of dog-owners has pledged to monitor the behavior of pets and their owners at the proposed new facility and to raise money to defray expenses estimated at $10,000 or more. After hearing Grover’s complaints, Second Ward Council Member, Dick Pacholl, agreed. “Cleaning up after the dogs will be a problem,” he said.

Austin Mayor Tom Stiehm, who supports the dog park idea, said he has visited a dog park at Rochester and believes such a facility can be property monitored and maintained in Austin with dog owners’ assistance.

Ray Kolb, who lives on 12th Avenue Southwest, is a critic of the proposed southwest location of the dog park from its inception and was blunt in his remarks to the Council Members Monday night.

“I’ve watched dogs (expletive deleted) in that vacant lot, and nobody ever cleans it up,” Kolb said.

He also said he has expressed his concerns to the mayor in a letter.

Kolb said the survey the PRF Department has relied upon to support its recommendation to the City Council for the dog park was “inadequate,” because, the citizen observed, “not everybody was home when they were contacted.”

At it’s most recent regular meeting, the Park Board voted unanimously to locate the dog park at the southwest site.

The motion came with stipulations that it would be strictly monitored and the facility and its location would be evaluated after a two-year trial.

The City Council has yet to consider the recommendation.

Dogs honored

On the same night, the Council Members heard the dog park criticisms, two canine members of the Austin Police Department were honored.

Lt. Matt Holten and Ghost finished fifth in the 2008 National Police Canine Association’s competitions for canines and their partners.

Officer Eric Blust and his canine partner, Bosco, finished sixth.

Holten is a veteran APD canine officer having worked with four dogs in his career.

Blust has worked with a single canine partner for two years.

Ghost and Bosco are brothers from a litter fathered by Tazer, the NPCA top-finishing partner of Sgt. Jeff Ellis of the Mower County Sheriff’s Office.

According to Holten, the trio of canines from the APD and MCSO were among more than 100 dogs, competing at Raleigh, N.C.

The APD Belgian Malamute breed dogs are cross-trained for patrol duties as well as narcotics detection.

The city presented the handlers and their canine partners with certificates of congratulations and appreciation for placing so high among the NPCA competitors.

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