OLDS — Residents have been complaining to the town and the Albertan that some people are walking their dogs – even letting them run free -- in the new Rotary Athletic Park.
Sometimes those dogs have defecated on the property. And in some of those cases, those droppings have not been picked up.
That’s not what the facility was designed for.
The $3.6 million park, located along 70th Avenue just north of Walmart, was completed last year and opened this year.
It features softball diamonds, baseball diamonds, a batting cage, soccer fields, horse shoe pits, washrooom facilities, 2.97 kilometres of paved pathways and a big parking lot.
“The Town is receiving feedback that there are people using the Rotary Athletic Park as a ‘dog run’. This is not allowed,” community services director Doug Wagstaff wrote in an email to the Albertan.
“Leashed or not, dogs are not permitted on any ball diamonds or playing fields, and as enticing as a large field space may seem, the new soccer pitches at Rotary Athletic Park are not allowed animals on them,” he said.
Wagstaff said municipal enforcement officers have been patrolling the area – including on bikes – but they can’t be there all the time.
“Like all our parks, we are not able to monitor it 24/7 to ensure people are (not) having their dogs run lose and defecate on the fields," he said. “We ask the public for their co-operation in all of the town open spaces to ensure dogs are not on playing fields at any time."
The Albertan went out to the park and sure enough, after arriving, caregivers allowed a dog to wander through the park by itself and it did indeed relieve itself on park property, although not on any of the athletic fields.
Wagstaff also pointed out that according to the town’s community standards bylaw 2015-08, a dog owner shall “ensure that the dog, when off the owner’s property, is on a leash and under the control of a competent person.”
He added that essentially, when in any green space or park, or on a trail, dogs must be on a leash.
The only exception to that rule is if they’re in the town-owned dog park, which opened in 2015 and is located along the north side of Highway 27, just west of 70th Avenue.
