This post was contributed by a community member. The views expressed here are the author's own.

Health & Fitness

Who Let the Dogs Out? (Or Why We Should)

A dog park would be a great addition to one of the city parks.

Meet Charlie, my 4-year-old chocolate lab. He is like any other typical dog (except in the true Labrador sense, he can never seem to remember how to swim and when he does, he doesn't like it much and he can't fetch so the whole "retriever" part of his title is lost on him). He does, however, love to RUN and PLAY.  I could take him for a four mile walk and he would still have energy but you get him together with a dog to run around and get a good game of chase going and after 20 minutes of that, he will sleep like the dead.

A couple of weeks ago I posted on the City of Clawson Facebook page and asked whether or not there were plans to put a dog run/park in Clawson. The response I got was "there are no plans to add a dog run due to space."

A couple of people commented on it, and pointed out that there are, in fact, several areas where a dog run could go in, and quite honestly, I don't get it. Royal Oak is cool enough to have a HUGE dog park on Campbell, south of 14 mile, plus several other areas that aren't official "parks" but dogs can go off leash. And I would just go buy a pass for Royal Oak, but quite frankly, paying $65 a year for non-resident rates kind of irks me. I would have no problem paying the City of Clawson if we had a dog park here, because it's my city, I live here, and I'd be happy to support it, as I'm sure others would too.

Find out what's happening in Clawsonwith free, real-time updates from Patch.

One thing that is great about Clawson is the number of parks and open areas we have here.  Clawson City Park is a huge space, and with the little nature trail and play areas, well pardon my ignorance, but I don't see how hard it would be to just throw some fences up in a corner there, or at one of the lesser used parks (say maybe on Rochester Road). I do understand that there are residences around the parks, and a lot of people would be opposed to it, but I'd be willing to bet that just as many would be for it. Especially because most dog parks you go to, people are respectful of it. They clean up after their dogs, and everyone that is there wants the park to be clean, well kept, and to stay open.

But that's just my opinion.

Find out what's happening in Clawsonwith free, real-time updates from Patch.

We’ve removed the ability to reply as we work to make improvements. Learn more here

The views expressed in this post are the author's own. Want to post on Patch?