Change doesn't come easily. To obtain a progressive dog-related policy, we need wide-ranging support and we need to exert constructive political pressure. To this end, we started the Citizen Canine e-mail community, developed a brochure, and organized this website. We also dialogue with City of Victoria and Capital Regional District decision-makers on behalf of good dogs and their responsible and caring owners. You can help by writing to elected officials in your area to let them know how you feel about limitations on access to dog owners.
Citizen Canine has now developed two working groups dealing with regional access to public lands for dogs and their owners. One focuses on the City of Victoria's critical need for more off-leash parks. The other focuses on the efforts to preserve the off-leash access in CRD parks.
Compared to municipalities like Saanich or Metchosin, Victoria has limited green space. With 75,000 residents there are many people with different recreational needs in the city, and these different activities compete for the limited park space available. City Council and the Parks and Recreation Department makes choices on how to allocate scarce open space. For the past ten years, Victoria has had only one area in the city-Dallas Road-where dogs are allowed off leash. It is Citizen Canine's belief that this allocation of space should be fair and responsive to the expressed needs of citizens…including those who own dogs.
In September the City of Victoria held a public forum to discuss a proposal to open up to ten new "leash-optional" parks in the city. Over 70 percent of the speakers at the forum supported such a move. In December a policy paper was approved by council which included recommendations to open nine parks on a limited basis to off-leash dogs. However, the paper also recommended imposing severe time restrictions at Dallas Road, the one area in the city that now allows dogs off-leash on a 24 hour basis.
Citizen Canine took on the task of informing the dog owners who use Dallas Road of this plan and many hundreds of dog owners contacted City Council to express their outrage at this plan. Thanks to the quick response by these dog owners, the City rescinded its recommendation and agreed to keep Dallas Road open to off-leash dogs 24 hours.
City Council approved all the other recommendations in the Victoria Parks Report and has begun a process of establishing a "Dogs in Parks Committee" to oversee the opening of nine other parks in the city to off-leash dogs on a very limited basis for a one-year trial period.
Citizen Canine welcomes the City of Victoria's recent decision to open this small network of parks. The new policy is a start towards bringing Victoria up to date with other cities across North America that benefit from neighbourhood off-leash recreational access.
There are, however some recommendations in the report that cause us significant concern:
The recommendation to restrict the off-leash access hours at Dallas Road. (This was rescinded at the January 8th City Council meeting, but there is concern that it will be brought forward again at a later date.)
The recommendation to prohibit dogs from access to sports fields.
The extremely limited access hours proposed in the new leash-optional parks.
The new "Dogs in Parks Committee" will oversee the final policies and the implementation of the trial opening of the nine new parks, and Citizen Canine will be applying to the city to have a representative included on that committee. It is our hope that we can work with the city to develop a "dogs in parks policy" this is both supportable and workable for dog owners and the general public.
Mill Hill/Francis-King/Thetis Lake Parks
A draft management plan for Mill Hill Park, Francis-King Park, and Thetis Lake Park was initiated by CRD Parks in 1998. The planning process included the Management Plan Advisory Group (MPAG) consisting of nine members: five representing specific park user groups, a CRD Parks volunteer warden, and three regular park-using Members-at-large.
Dog owners were not represented as a park user group.
The Draft Management Plan was formally presented to the CRD Parks Committee on March 3, 2003 and a public meeting for input was held April 2. When dog owners became aware of a recommendation in the Plan to require that dogs be on leash throughout the three parks they were outraged and opposition to the recommendation began to grow. Members of Citizen Canine and the Capital Comets Dog Sports Club took the lead in organizing dog owners in their protest against the recommendation. Print and Web-based petitions gathered over 2,000 signatures. The public meeting facility could not accommodate the number of people who turned out to let the CRD know how they felt about the recommendation, so a second meeting had to be scheduled. It was similarly well-attended.
CRD Parks Chair Karen Watson announced at the start of the second meeting on April 16 that she would recommend to the Parks Committee that a representative from the dog owner community be added to the MPAG. This was done and Mark Hawkes, from Citizen Canine and the Capital Comets Dog Sports Club, joined the MPAG and has been representing the interests of dog owners at nearly monthly meetings since July, 2003. Mark has provided regular summaries of the meetings which can be found on the Citizen Canine forum. Minutes of the meetings and other pertinent documents can be found here.
Mark presented two proposals to the MPAG: a general one addressing all three parks and a revised proposal for Francis-King Park. The revision
became necessary when the CRD introduced a previously unmentioned concern with regard to off-leash dogs disrupting park nature programs.
The MPAG did not accept either proposal in whole, and have voted in favor of more restrictive approaches. As a result, Mark refused to sign
the MPAG final agreement and gave a detailed accounting of his reasons in a four page letter to the Chair.
Next, CRD Parks got permission from the Parks Committee to hold a public open house in order to answer questions about the Agreement and receive
public input in the form of written comments.
Shortly afterward, CRD Parks began a summer-long survey of park users, with a particular emphasis on dog-related problems in the parks.
At the October 6th, 2004 meeting of the Parks Committee, CRD Parks presented a staff report which recommended a couple of amendments to the
Agreement, based on feedback received. The key change was to allow dogs off leash year round on the Upper Thetis lakeshore trail, but require
them to be leashed year round on the Lower Thetis lakeshore trail. The combined effect of a Citizen Canine letter to the CRD Board of Directors
and the Committee members, plus half-a-dozen speeches from dog owners attending the meeting swayed 5 of the 7 Committee members to vote
against the amended plan. CRD staff were directed to go back to the drawing board and prepare a dog management plan that emphasized
education and the enforcement of existing bylaws first, and only included leashing proposals where they could be justified with scientific evidence of their necessity.
CRD Parks' next attempt at a plan will probably be tabled in the early spring of 2005. Meanwhile, it's back to the status-quo in the three
parks. If not for Citizen Canine, dogs would now be required to be on leash there, instead.
Dogs have long been an important part of our society. They provide important benefits to people and families that cannot be measured in monetary terms. Research shows that dogs are more than just companions; they also promote the physical and emotional health of their owners. The importance of dogs in society has even helped spawn a new field of study, urban animal management, which aims to ensure that animals are taken care of in the urban environment. One of the ways to ensure that dogs are cared for in the urban environment is through the provision of off-leash recreational areas. These areas provide benefits to both people and dogs.
Greater Victoria has a wealth of recreational areas, beaches, and open spaces enjoyed by residents and visitors alike. With temperate weather year-round, families and individuals enjoy hiking in nature, exploring beaches, running, cycling, playing sports like soccer, baseball, tennis, golf, as well as playing and walking with their dogs. While some municipalities allow liberal access by off-leash dogs to parks and greenspace, others do not. Saanich offers the most liberal off-leash access by allowing dogs that are under control of a competent person to be off leash in most green spaces. In Oak Bay and Esquimalt there are a number of designated off-leash areas for dogs. Victoria has lagged behind with only one off-leash area for dogs at Dallas Road.
Citizen Canine believes that it is the right of taxpaying responsible dog owning residents to have fair and reasonable access to city parks to exercise their dogs off-leash. Approximately one third of Victoria households have a dog, yet there is currently only one area in the city where these people can take their dogs to play off leash. At the same time, many small parks and playing fields stand empty most of the year. We are pleased that the City of Victoria now recognizes the legitimacy of dog owners' requests for off-leash access.
Benefits of Off-Leash Areas
We believe that there needs to be more provision in our urban environment of places where people can play with their dogs off-leash. Off leash areas provide space where people can train their dogs as well as take their dogs to socialize with other dogs. Responsible dog owners know that dogs in urban environments must have daily off-leash exercise and opportunities to interact with other dogs and with new people. Dogs that experience this are healthier and show less aggressive and anti-social behavior towards humans and other dogs.
Off-leash areas are important not only to dog owners, but also to the community at large. Shared parks provide places where neighbours can meet and interact and develop a sense of community. Many people who are not able to keep a pet enjoy the opportunity to see dogs at play. Also, off-leash areas offer adults the opportunity to teach children how to safely interact with dogs. As well, there are obvious health and physical benefits for the dog owners who are being active in an outdoor environment.
The benefits are clearly not lost on the general public, with an 2001 Ipsos poll revealing the majority (75%) of BC residents supportive of off-leash parks.
It's important for off-leash access to be available in a network of parks throughout the city to accommodate the needs of people-including the elderly and the disabled-who depend on the companionship of dogs but cannot easily travel long distances. There are a great many people with dogs who would feel safe and comfortable spending time with other dog owners in parks in their own neighbourhoods. Few of these citizens play softball or soccer or tennis, and yet their recreational needs are not at present being met in Victoria. These people pay taxes too.
There's another community benefit for opening up more parks to off-leash access, and that is increased use of parks. Very often the parks that are left vacant for most of the time become targets for vandals or other illicit activities. Dog owners are reliable users of public green space. They are there with their dogs every day, rain or shine, winter or summer. The presence of a responsible contingent of dog owners offers support and monitoring for parks in Victoria.
Advocacy
