After weeks of vocal opposition, Saanich council has put its controversial plan to significantly restrict where dogs can be off-leash in parks on hold for two weeks.
This week, council agreed to postpone two readings of its amended Animals Bylaw until Sept. 25 to allow council time to reflect on another round of public input. In June, council voted unanimously to approve the bylaw amendments.
Coun. Colin Plant said he expected to continue with the implementation of the People, Pets and Parks strategy, an attempt to balance the interests of park users, dog owners and commercial dog walkers.
“But I am persuaded after tonight’s input that we perhaps should have a further discussion,” he said at Monday night’s council meeting.
“We need to make sure we’ve got it perfect. And although perfect may never be attainable in all people’s eyes, I’m willing to take some of the guidance by some people tonight to take my time in making this decision.”
Plant said he is still inclined to support the bylaw, but would like time to confer with his colleagues and the public.
In an interview Tuesday, Mayor Dean Murdock opened the door to further amending the bylaw, pointing specifically to concerns raised about the difficulties of walking a dog on-leash for someone with mobility challenges.
“Certainly we’ll be looking to address that and I suspect based on some of the input that we received that we likely will be looking at other opportunities to make changes to the bylaw before it goes to final reading.”
The pause was seen as a small victory Tuesday by off-leash advocates.
“It’s not what I expected,” said Trish Fougner, director of the CRD DOGG Society, which has been fighting for off-leash areas for dogs in the region.
“I thought for sure they were just going to ram it through, because that’s basically what they’ve done right from the start. It gives me some hope that they’re actually finally listening.”
Eulala Mills, interim president of the CRD DOGG Society, called for a “complete step back” and the creation of a community advisory committee on the issue.
The biggest change in the updated Animals Bylaw would require all pets to be on-leash in Saanich parks unless they are within a designated leash-optional area, which set off a series of protests from dog owners and professional dog walkers.
Public hearings on the bylaw change have been packed with people wanting to weigh in.
Currently, the bylaw allows dogs to be off-leash under owner control in all parks.
The new rules would mean 57 of Saanich’s 172 parks would have off-leash areas, and 12 of those would have fenced off-leash areas, including a 1.5-kilometre trail loop within Mount Douglas Park and a four-hectare fenced area with trails in Cuthbert Holmes Park. Cordova Bay Beach would be off-leash year-round.
On Monday night, council again got an earful from dozens of residents who said the off-leash rules would have an immense effect on the mental health of themselves and their dogs. Some even argued the rules will have a negative effect on the environment as it could force some people to drive to areas where they can have their dogs off leash.
In voting to postpone the reading for two weeks, Coun. Karen Harper told council Monday she had heard some “very thoughtful and very compelling arguments, particularly in relation to people who have physical challenges and so I think that there are issues that we do need to explore.”
But Harper, like many of her colleagues, said that does not mean council is willing to scrap the strategy and start again.
“I’m not prepared to re-litigate everything either, but I do think that there are issues that are definitely worth fleshing out and certainly providing a mechanism that perhaps would provide some comfort to the community that we are going to deal with things like issues in relation to disability,” she said.
Mills said her group and others will use the next two weeks to try and speak with as many councillors and Saanich staff on the issue as possible.
“Hopefully we can have a real conversation about some things that can make a real difference,” she said.
Murdock said the changes are motivated by a desire to reduce environmental damage to parks and head off potential conflict as a growing population uses parks more often.
“What I think we’re hearing from folks who are raising concerns is that they find some of the proposed restrictions go too far and too fast,” he said. “When we reconvene in a couple of weeks, there’ll be an opportunity to ask questions and to propose changes to the bylaw.”
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