on thursday night there was a public hearing about our beloved dog park. on the panel was the mayor of santa cruz, our state assembly representative, a representative from the state parks, a woman who has done a study specifically on the impact of dogs at state parks and beaches, the animal control person for santa cruz county and a representative of friends of lighthouse field, which is the organization that the dog owners have formed.
i was so frustrated by this meeting that i actually started crying. here's why. i've been working, diligently on this dog park issue for over a year. i've written complete and thoughtful proposals about how we have over 20,000 dogs in the city of santa cruz and that if they suddenly are denied off-leash exercise opportunities the community health issues that this will cause not only for the dogs but for their humans, as well. and i've offered solutions. viable solutions. not just pie-in-the-sky solutions.
so on thursday night i wanted to at least discuss these possible alternative solutions. because, honestly, there's a very strong likelihood that the current dog park is not going to be retained by the city and will become a state park and state parks mandate that dogs are not allowed off-leash and often that dogs are not allowed, period.
when the question was raised about what the city plans to do if, come november, the current park is no longer accessible to dogs, the mayor said "i expect all of you to be there with your dogs, off-leash, in civil disobedience!"
now, we all know that i am one who will most certainly perform civil disobedience if warranted. however, what upset me was that the mayor of our city was actually condoning this rather than at least prefacing it with, "the city of santa cruz understands that the dogs' and their owners' health and well-being is critical and that off-leash access is a very important part of this and we will do whatever is necessary to assure that there is a sanctioned off-leash exercise area for the dogs should lighthouse field not be available."
those words, that promise, was never uttered. not once. the entire evening. and that really made me angry. what we got instead was a lot of hot air. a lot of "we're with you in this fight to keep lighthouse field." but the truth of the matter is that if they were REALLY in the fight with us, they would have extended the lease from the get-go. and they also, in knowing that they were NOT going to extend the lease, would have said, "we're not able to extend our lease on lighthouse field, but understand that dogs being able to exercise off-leash is very important for the health of our city and we will be providing an off-leash dog park for all santa cruz dogs."
when will we hear those words? when will this city step up and say, "dogs are important. and so are their tax paying owners. and here is a dog park that is just for them!"
they need to say it soon. other cities have shown how much they care. come on, santa cruz. show you care!
