By JAN LARSON McLAUGHLIN
BG Independent News
Dogs in city parks … and a city park for dogs were both discussed at Tuesday evening’s meeting of the Bowling Green City Parks and Recreation Board.
Parks and Recreation Director Kristin Otley had previously asked citizens using the city parks to notify park patrons with unleashed dogs that they were violating city rules.
“It’s not just a park policy, it’s an ordinance in the city of Bowling Green,” Otley said.
But when she was on the trails in Wintergarden Park over the weekend, Otley decided to switch up her strategy.
“I thanked people for having their dogs on leashes,” she said.
As she was leaving the park, she even noticed a cat on a leash – also required under a city ordinance.
The policy is for everyone’s safety – humans and pets, Otley said. Even the best behaved canines could be tempted to run off with all the deer and other wildlife in the parks.
Otley told the park board about previously seeing a pig dressed in a tuxedo in the park, as part of a wedding ceremony.
“If you can get a pig in a tuxedo on a leash, you can get a dog on a leash,” park board member Jodi Anderson said.
Earlier this summer, a Bowling Green woman walking in Wintergarden Park was bitten by a dog that had been designated as a “dangerous dog” by the Wood County Dog Warden.
The woman received multiple puncture wounds to her upper arm, and was taken to Wood County Hospital.
According to the Bowling Green Police report, the woman was walking in the park when she heard someone yelling for his dog, which was running loose. She captured the dog and took it back to the man, who had another dog on a leash.
As she approached the man, the dog on the leash jumped on her and bit her upper arm, forcing her to the ground.
The man had already been warned for having a loose dog in Wintergarden Park in 2017. And in 2018, the dog had reportedly bitten another woman in the park. As a result of that incident, the dog had been determined to be a “dangerous dog.”
Also at Tuesday’s park and rec board meeting, Bowling Green City Council member Bill Herald said he has heard from a number of people interested in a dog park being established in the city.
Herald asked that the issue be placed on the park board’s agenda at its strategic planning. Several issues would need to be considered, he said, including the size of the area, whether or not it’s enclosed, and rules such as whether dogs would be required to be vaccinated to use the area, or whether memberships would be required.
Herald suggested that the possibility for a dog park be studied at the same time as the park master plan update.
