On Wednesday May 2nd, the Oakland Planning Commission denied the conditional use permit for the Lakeview Dog Play Area.

According to the Trust for Public Land,  Seattle turns out to be a model city where a dog owner group called COLA (Citizens for Off Leash Areas) pushed for reforms in the 90’s when the off-leash trend began escalating. One of the most powerful things the group did was to help identify about 70 possible sites, with a pilot program taking place in eight of these sites. The pilot plan showed that the city could take charge. Additionally, this pilot plan helped to identify criteria that would make for successful site location. Those criteria turned out to be:

1. Avoid interference with other established uses or department sponsored activities
2. Avoid locations directly abutting residences
3. Assure availability of close-by parking
4. Avoid locations near children’s play areas
5. Choose spots where there are minimal impacts on the visual character of a park
6. Avoid site where there will be spill-over into non-dog areas
7. Avoid sensitive environmental habitats. 

They also learned to avoid spaces that have history stating that it’s a lot easier than persuading people to change how a space is viewed and used.

Read more here.

The Parks and Recreation Advisory Commission met on July 13th to hear presentations on and objections to the alternative location and the Astro Park proposal. 18 people spoke out in opposition to the Astro Park proposal. The Commissioners voted (3 for, 3 against, 1 abstention) not to issue any recommendation to the Planning department as to whether to approve or reject the change of use of this space.

We were told that Since PRAC is an advisory body, the decision by PRAC not to recommend the change of use does not stop the change of use application proceeding to the planning department. Council staff promised an update with next steps would come soon after the meeting, as of 20th August we have not received that update.

See the East Bay Express article by Nate Seltenrich

A beautiful spring evening brought the people of Oakland out to Lake Merritt to relax and have fun in the lovely evening light. Our photographer captured some of the feeling of the evening.

Stunning insight, eh? Well, it's true too for Astro Park. Plans for the dog run don't involve putting in any lighting. Yet the proposal is to keep the run open for use until 10pm every night, summer and winter. We went to take some photos of the space at 9:30pm.

Wondering why there haven't been many people walking about on Astro Park (aside from the childrens play area) recently? So were we... until we tried to set foot on it. We went and bought suitable footgear and tried again. See what we found...

Inspired by the idea that Ohlone Dog Park in Berkeley represents a great example of what a fenced in dog run with wood chips can be, we went to take a look. We were very concerned.

See our photos here.

Councilmembers Nancy Nadel and Pat Kernighan thanked those who participated at the Community Meeting for listening to their neighbors' concerns and participating in a civil discourse. There is much work still to be done! See updates on local newspapers' takes on the meeting at our Media page.