Town Council approves Nashua Road dog park

Friday, February 3, 2012

BEDFORD – Bark all about it.

A five year effort to bring a dog park to Bedford was finally approved by Town Councilors last Wednesday in a 7-0 vote.

“The work of the committee is now complete,” Dog Park Committee Chairman Fred Hurwitz said of their decision. “The Friends of Bedford Canine Corner is excited to work with the town.”

The council decision designated a fenced in area of Riley Field, 200 by 75 feet in size, for Bedford’s approximately 3,400 dogs to play unleashed on the corner of Nashua and County Roads.

The Dog Park Committee formed a nonprofit, the Friends of Bedford Canine Corner, to raise funds for the park and to build and maintain it.

The park will be split into two play areas, specific to large and small canines and their owners.

Leading up to the town’s approval, abutting property owners on Pinecrest Drive voiced problems with a dog park in their backyards. The dog park committee appointed Doug Blais, the closet neighbor to the park, to accommodate their concerns.

“I want to give Doug credit,” Hurwitz said. “He did an excellent and fair job representing the interests of the people on Pinecrest to the committee and did a fair job representing the dog park’s point of view back to the residents. That was significant in achieving the progress we had with the neighbors.”

The council debated the town’s responsibility in operating the dog park once it was built.

Ultimately they settled on some town staff hours patrolling the park, including those of Bedford Animal Control Officer Steve Paul.

The council also determined that the construction, maintenance and operational costs of the park, including monitoring, would be provided by the fundraising efforts of Friends of Canine Corner while the enforcement and the determination of dog park hours would be the responsibility of the town.

The approval is also subject to a contract between the town and the Friends of Bedford Canine Corner, as well as sound mitigation to be performed on the park.

“We are excited to get to work with the town, to complete the agreement and to roll out our communication and fundraising,” Hurwitz said.

People interested in volunteering or donating towards the dog park should contact Hurwitz at fred.hurwitz@bedfordcaninecorner.org or Sandy Lamontagne, Chair of the Friends of Bedford Canine Corner, at sandy.lamontagne@bedfordcaninecorner.org.

Maryalice Gill can be reached at 594-6490 or mgill@nashuatelegraph.com. Follow Gill on Twitter (@Telegraph_MAG).