Fwd: NYCdog... anti-dog lawsuit

[Seth Sicroff]

From: "Robert Marino" <ramny...@yahoo.com>
To: "Alision" <mar...@optonline.net>
Sent: Saturday, April 15, 2006 6:23 PM
Subject: NYCdog... anti-dog lawsuit


> Alison.... this is story of what is happening here...
> Bob
>
> PS.. also look here:
> http://www.dogwoodpark.com/index.php   incredible
>
>
> You might want to share this at ITHACA
>
> Dog Pals Offer to Take Civic for a Walk
> By Phil Guie Dateline : Thursday, April 13, 2006
> http://www.queensledger.com/StoryDisplay.asp?PID=1&NewsStoryID=3505
> Two weeks after engaging in a shouting match with dog
> lovers, Juniper Park Civic Association President Bob
> Holden has not backed down from his stance of keeping
> canines out of public parks. Dog advocates, meanwhile,
> have stepped up their efforts to change his mind by
> offering to show him some of the city's better dog
> runs.
> Bob Marino, who serves as President of the New York
> Council of Dog Owner Groups, was unable to attend the
> March 23rd general membership meeting, during which
> Holden initially denied opponents the chance to
> address the public, and was the recipient of some
> harsh name-calling as a result. Marino sent a memo in
> his stead, urging Holden to postpone his lawsuit
> against Commissioner Adrian Benepe of the New York
> City Parks Department. The lawsuit accuses Benepe of
> failing to enforce an NYC health code by not enforcing
> leash laws in public parks at all times.
> Both parties spoke on the phone with each other
> several days afterward. According to Marino, it was
> during their conversation that Holden agreed to the
> tour. "When we originally spoke, he said he was
> willing to go with us," Marino said. "There was no
> specific time and place scheduled, but Bob Holden said
> 'I'd be interested in the showing.' We were hoping to
> show him Thompson Square in Manhattan and possibly one
> other."
> When reached by phone, however, Holden claimed no
> knowledge of any planned visit to a dog run. "Nobody
> called me. Nobody e-mailed me," he said. "This is the
> first I'm hearing about it." The Ledger called Holden
> back with the approximate date of the conversation,
> which was provided by Marino. The civic association
> president said that he recalled speaking to the dog
> advocate, but denied agreeing to any tour.
> "We spoke a week ago," he said. "Robert Marino asked
> me to reconsider the lawsuit. We also spoke about the
> condition of dog runs in Queens County. I said that 90
> percent of them were horrendous, and he agreed. He
> said he would try to contact Commissioner Benepe about
> a compromise. That was the last I heard from him."
> Holden would not say whether he could be enticed to
> visit more public dog runs outside of his home
> borough, and said that Marino should call him
> personally if he wants to discuss any such activity.
> If Holden decides to push ahead with the lawsuit
> without first doing more research, it would be a
> rolled-up newspaper to the noses of dog lovers, who
> seemed to view the tour as their best bet to influence
> his decision. Marino, who works as a self-employed
> real estate consultant, sounded optimistic that Holden
> could still be convinced to go along.
> "If I was led to believe that Bob Holden could not be
> shown proof that good dog runs exist and that dog runs
> could be better, I would not be approaching him," he
> said. Then he spoke enthusiastically about the dog
> park in Thompson Square, which he said could be a
> model for the one-acre park that advocates would like
> to see in Juniper Park.
> "Let me tell you about Thompson Square Park, which Bob
> Holden has not seen," Marino said. "It's 18,000 square
> feet... It won an award for one of the best small
> urban dog parks in the nation, and received a $10,000
> gift as a result. It has a small dog area. It has
> chips that you can sprinkle around to help clean it
> up. It has doggie bags. Benches have been brought in
> so people can sit and chat while monitoring their
> dogs. [It has been] incredibly successful."
> Marino attributed the park's success to the
> involvement of the community - something he said is
> not so common in Queens. "The problem with Queens is
> that it's a community with many private homes, and
> many people tend to be private with their own lives,"
> he said. "It's easier when you go to the park [to have
> your behavior policed]."
> He pointed to Forest Park, which is adjacent to
> Woodhaven and Kew Gardens, as an example of what can
> happen when a community does come together. "The
> community organized around Forest Park," he said.
> "They had 600 members who, alongside the Parks
> Department, were working together to improve dog parks
> for everyone."
> Having seen his fair share of dog runs in parks,
> Marino did not dispute Holden's comment that the run
> he saw was "a fence with dirt." He said that sub-par
> dog runs do exist, and used Flushing Meadows Park as
> an example. "The Parks Department did not create an
> adequate dog park there. They created a dog run, but
> not a dog park. There were a lot of neighborhood dogs,
> and Parks [Department] felt it was better to put up a
> fence than to have nothing. And they were right. But
> originally, in Flushing, they did not have an
> organization working to better the park."
> Organized citizens, he argued, could keep in check
> those owners who fail to pick up their dogs' feces,
> who threaten to turn beautiful parklands into public
> pet toilets. "The dog owners realize that... there are
> dog owners who don't follow the rules, and they would
> like to remind them that respect is a two-way street,"
> Marino said.
> He offered up the Juniper Park Dog Association, whose
> membership consists of between 40 and 50 dog owners,
> as an example of a local community group that
> effectively polices its own.
> As of press time, Marino said that the New York
> Council of Dog Owner Groups, or NYC Dog, hopes to
> continue working with the civic association and Queens
> Parks Commissioner Dorothy Lewandowski to develop a
> reasonably-sized dog run in Juniper Park. In the
> meantime, they can probably rule out the support of
> Council Member Dennis Gallagher, whose office recently
> sent a letter to Lewandowski reminding the Parks
> Department that Community Board 5, private citizens,
> and the Queens Civic Congress have voted against a
> Juniper Park dog run, and have voted to enforce leash
> laws at all times in public parks.
> Gallagher also expressed disappointment that the Parks
> Department has made no effort to obtain a small area
> of land at 57th Ave and 80th St., which he said would
> make an ideal location for two dog runs, from the
> state. "I will gladly advocate for City Council
> funding for the development [at that location]," he
> stated. "The location would not interfere with any
> other usage as it would in Juniper Valley Park and is
> a mere few blocks away from the park itself."
> Marino, however, argued that any prospective site must
> satisfy the particular expectations of both dog owners
> and non-owners. "What sites meet the criteria to
> handle the proper number of dogs that use the park?"
> said Marino. "We have to make sure this is not
> something that creates noise for neighbors or creates
> disturbances for someone nearby. We would prefer
> somewhere in the middle of [Juniper] Park, so that
> it's easy to get to for everyone, and far enough away
> from people's homes. [But] we're not going to say,
> 'This or nothing.' That would not be fair."
> And of course, there is the matter of that lawsuit.
> Along with his argument that dogs off the leash in
> Juniper Park would be a menace, Holden has also
> accused Parks Commissioner Benepe of trying to pull an
> end-run around residents by not bringing the issue
> before the community board in the first place.
> "Everyone is saying that the civic association doesn't
> want a dog run, but we have nothing to do with dog
> runs," he said. "If a group wants a dog run, it goes
> through the community board. Any city agency should go
> through the community board, and that's not what's
> going on here. Our stance is that we just want Benepe
> to enforce the [leash] law."
>
>
>
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