Press

September 13th, 2006, Five Cities Times Press Recorder

Arroyo Grande may have site for dog park

Dog lovers who formerly let their canine companions run free at Costa Bella Park in Grover Beach may have a new home for leashless leisure, and it’s triple the size of the former site.

“I miss those friends,” Five Cities Dog Park Association President Cynthia Eklund said of those she met at Costa Bella before the Grover Beach City Council ordered enforcement of the leash law. “I would like to know what happened to all of those people. Where is everybody?”

A 5-acre unlandscaped retention basin owned by the city of Arroyo Grande at South Elm Street and The Pike may be transformed into the first official Five Cities area dog park.

City Manager Steve Adams said the city’s Parks and Recreation Commission in January will consider a proposal to develop the site as a dog park and come up with recommendations for the City Council.

Since San Luis Obispo County Division of Animal Services officials told residents their canines couldn’t roam leashless at the 1.3-acre Costa Bella last December and started issuing tickets, association members and Arroyo Grande have been working with city and county parks officials to find an alternate site.

Eklund formerly recreated with her basset hound at Costa Bella on a regular basis and said she misses the social atmosphere of the former unofficial dog park.

“We got kicked out,” she said. “It’s kind of sad because there are a lot of people who do like to recreate with dogs.”

The registered nonprofit association was formed in February after officials started enforcing the “no dogs off leash” policy at Costa Bella, she said.

Currently, it is illegal for residents to have their dogs off-leash at South County parks.

But for years, friends and owners of dogs conceded city officials had turned a blind eye to people who used the unlandscaped retention basin at the corner of Oak Park Boulevard and Farroll Road as the sole unofficial off-leash dog park in the Five Cities.

Grover Beach city staff researched turning the park into an official off-leash dog park last summer, but the City Council tabled the idea, citing the cost to install infrastructure and maintain it — including the necessary fencing to keep dogs inside the park.

Since May, 4th District Supervisor Katcho Achadjian has met on site at several locations with Arroyo Grande parks officials and the association to identify a South County location suitable for a dog park.

Currently, the group is meeting with neighbors in the area to develop a proposal to give the Parks and Recreation Commission to develop a recommendation to the City Council.

Eklund estimates the cost of creating a dog park at “$15,000 to $40,000, depending on how fancy a dog park you get.” The project would require a three-way partnership between the association, the city and county, with the association responsible for funding and maintaining the site.

Currently, the association is looking for pledges of funding, Eklund said.

The total cost will involve landscaping, installing wrought-iron fencing, water for the dogs and lighting and ongoing maintenance, including waste management, she said.

Adams said the site is currently utilized for drainage only a portion of the year.

“It’s a vacant piece of property that’s only good for when it rains — it has no other use,” Achadjian said. “But we can turn it into a good use for summer use.”

In Nipomo, an off-leash dog park is located at Nipomo Community Park, and another is situated at El Chorro Regional Park in San Luis Obispo.

“People need a place for dogs,” Achadjian said. “I met with Pismo, Arroyo Grande, and Grover parks folks and said, ‘Where can we go?’ There’s a need, but there’s no place for the need to go to.”

If the City Council approves the project, “I'll get to work by putting another partnership together, by bringing the county into the picture to raise money to turn it into a dog park,” Achadjian said.

Adams said the city is currently not recommending utilizing city funds for the project.

Create a bark park

Anyone interested in pledging money for the proposed off-leash dog park project can visit www.fivecitiesdogpark.org or call 270-6DOG.

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