Mar Vista canine owners have paid for right to use dog park
AIRPORT PARK This place is going to the dogs.
More than 60 Los Angeles residents have paid $15.50 for a tag that allows their pooches to use the nearly 1 acre, off-leash dog area at Airport Park, city officials said.
That number is expected to increase when a grace period that has been in effect since the park opened in April is lifted and enforcement begins on Jan. 1. Residents already pay a licensing fee of $15 for spayed or neutered pets, and $50 for unaltered dogs.
Usage appears to be unchanged, with approximately half the users from Santa Monica and half from Los Angeles, said Trinie Garcia-Valdez, community use administrator for City Hall.
Los Angeles residents are happy that they now have the option of using the park legally for what many consider to be a small fee that will help maintain the dog area, which needs to be cleaned regularly, with maintenance crews bringing in fresh wood chips every four to six weeks. City staff said around $25,000 a year is needed to clean and maintain the dog area.
“This is a great community resource,” said Keith Lambert, director of the Mar Vista Neighborhood Council who last week purchased a dog tag for his pooch Winzer, a stray his family adopted.
“I have a bigger dog so giving him a place to run that’s longer than 20 feet is great,” Lambert added. “The dogs get to socialize and that’s really cool. The people there are generally friendly. We rarely ask for each other’s names, but we know their dog’s name. It’s all about the dogs here.”
Mar Vista residents like Lambert fought hard for access to the dog area after they learned that they would not be allowed to use it under a policy adopted by the City Council in the 1990s when City Hall began building off-leash dog areas at the request of residents. The law prohibits dogs that are not licensed in Santa Monica from using the city’s three dog parks and one dog run.
Mar Vista residents complained and held a protest in April at the grand opening of the Airport Park, the city’s first newly-constructed park to open in the last 24 years. There were handmade signs blasting city officials for excluding Los Angeles residents from the dog park, a move that was done to ensure that Santa Monicans and their 5,500 licensed dogs could use it without having to worry about overcrowding and excessive wear and tear.
Mar Vista residents felt they should be allowed to use the dog area since it is located just yards from many of their homes. They said that they work, shop and dine in Santa Monica and put up with the noise and pollution coming from the Santa Monica Airport. That should be enough to allow them entrance to the dog area, they said during meetings with the Recreation and Parks Commission and the council.
City staff initially offered Mar Vista residents 15 permits as part of a pilot program but that proposal was rejected. Mar Visa residents said they did not know how to distribute the permits fairly.
Various media outlets jumped on the story following a second protest involving Los Angeles City Councilman Bill Rosendahl.
City staff said they wanted time to monitor usage at the park to see if there was a strong demand from residents before letting Los Angeles dog owners in. A survey found that there wasn’t much of a demand, prompting staff to go before the council with the recommendation to open it up to everyone, something with was supported by parks and rec.
Over the course of 15 weeks, a maximum of 24 dogs were seen at the park at any one time and during most of the day there were far fewer dogs, city staff said. The most popular times for use are on weekday and weekend afternoons and evenings, with weekend use being slightly higher overall.
The dog area is open from 7:30 a.m. to 8:30 p.m. on weekdays, and 8:30 a.m. to 8:30 p.m. on weekends. That’s the hours for Joslyn Park, Pacific Street and Airport Park only. For Memorial Park, the hours are from 6 a.m. to 8:30 p.m. for both weekdays and weekends. A person is allowed to bring only four dogs at a time into an off-leash area, a limit put in place by the council after some complained about professional dog walkers taking up too much room.
If usage patterns at the park change and grow to a point where the annual fee for dog tags does not support maintenance needs, the council could re-examine the policy and make changes.
At the park on Sunday, Julie Tarrero was with her collie Beatrice, watching her little dog run around in circles. Tarrero did not have a tag yet, but she was planning on getting one before the Jan. 1 deadline.
“I’m one of those people who puts things off until the last minute,” she said. “I’ll definitely get one, though. This place is great, the people are nice and the animals are for the most part well trained … It’s so close to my home. I don’t know where else I would go if I couldn’t go here.”
Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on December 10, 2007. Read the original PDF.