Health & Fitness
DogGone It! Part 3 - Lessons Learned
What are the lessons to learn from the past 8 months watching the Parks and Recreation Commission (PRC) search, without success, for a location for a dog park?
DON’T LIMIT YOURSELF
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The PRC began by limiting itself to city owned parks. In my considerable experience, one doesn’t start by limiting oneself. You might end up there, but you certainly don’t start there, because by limiting yourself there isn’t much room to maneuver.
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DON’T CHANGES HORSE IN MID-STREAM
The PRC made a fatal mistake by starting with one perspective (one city wide Dog Park), changing to another (dog zones in several parks) and ending up with a third (one city wide dog park in a park suited for a dog zone).
SPEND THE EFFORT TO ACHIEVE YOUR GOAL
The PRC wanted to look at only city owned parks because looking at the rest of the space was “more work”. After they finally chose one park, and got opposition from the neighbors, instead of trying the next park, they gave up on the idea that dog parks could work in city parks. Very few things in life are achieved without some effort.
FAILURE TO LOOK AT THE BIG PICTURE
There are a half dozen new parks going to be added to the City in the near future, and along with these parks comes 12,000+ people, as well as some 4,000+ dogs. At no time in the 8 months of discussing the dog park was any consideration given to these new homes, people, and dogs, much less to the new parks coming on stream.
NEXT STEP
When the PRC reports back to the Council that after 8 months they were unable to come up with a suitable location for a dog park in Lake Forest, I trust that the Council will do the right thing, take it out of the hands of the PRC, establishing a “working committee to create a dog park”, and have this group do the rest. A staff member should be assigned to do some leg work from an official POV and one or two of the PRC Commissioners should also serve since they have a lot of experience in this area. Indeed, had the PRC been reconstituted as a committee instead of as the Commission they are, I think this might have been solved a long time ago.
Their mission, if they decide to accept it, is to find a home for off leash dog owners in Lake Forest to take their pets. Any piece of property in any part of town should be on the plate.
Ultimately, with the problems solved, the committee can turn the choice back to the PRC for them to do what it is that they do.
And while they’re at it, the PRC needs to move forward now for planning the dog parks in the 4,000+ new homes that are going to be built. I’ve already outlined how and where this should happen. Given how slowly they approached the last task, they’ll need the lead time with these new homes being built to come to decisions where and how to put the new dog parks or zones. Indeed, there may even be a site in these new developments where a city wide park could be built.