The City of College Station currently has four areas where dogs are allowed to roam free and be off their leash, including a small area in Lick Creek Park.
During a previous College Station City Council meeting, members discussed implementing more leash-free areas and potential areas where the enforcement of dogs on their leash is necessary in the event of someone or another animal getting hurt.
The current off-leash ordinance for the city states that all dogs must be kept on a leash and under control, unless they are in a designated leash-free area, according to Steve Wright, College Station’s director of Parks and Recreation.
“We have designated 3.7 areas in our parks that are leash-free areas: Barracks Park, University Park, Steeplechase Park and over at Lick Creek Park, the majority of that park requires the dog to be on a leash,” Wright told the council. “There is a certain [space] located on Raccoon Run that is located within Lick Creek Park that is currently allowed to have dogs off leash.”
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He went on to note that the city’s code enforcement officers and animal control can issue citations if residents are not following the current ordinance. Council member Linda Harvell asked Wright if there is currently a demand for more off-leash parks.
Wright said this topic was being discussed in regard to Lick Creek Park, where it has been hard for residents to determine and understand which areas they can have their dog on and off their leash and keep them in those areas.
“It’s hard to control and a couple of patrons had reached out with some complaints about having all dogs under control,” Wright said. “We did research to see if there were calls from Lick Creek to Animal Control. There weren’t any phone calls made but that doesn’t mean there wasn’t an issue. I periodically visit it, and people do want to make sure their animal is safe. … We had an unfortunate incident in Houston with one dog on the leash and one not and the little [dog] didn’t make it. It’s not a problem until it is a problem. We like to think we have them under control but it is a shared space.”
Councilmember John Crompton urged the parks department to look into potentially doing away with the off-leash area in Lick Creek Park, and instead designating the Smith Tract Park in College Station as a shared space for people to hike and for their dogs to roam off leash. Some of the other councilmembers agreed with Crompton’s proposal.
“I think we need to terminate the off-leash area at Raccoon Run,” Crompton said. “When that big dog comes along and bangs down my 2-year-old granddaughter and knocks her to the floor and she damages herself, and I sue the city for a million dollars, we don’t have much of a defense if we are enforcing this everywhere else in the park and not there. I was initially in favor of this, but as more people move in, it is not a question of if there will be an incident but when.”
The city’s lawyers assured the council that if in the event someone was injured in a park by someone else’s animal, the city would not be held responsible for the incident. Councilmember Elizabeth Cuhna liked Crompton’s idea about utilizing Smith Tract; however, she said she was hesitant to make Lick Creek an on-leash only area without substituting it with another space.
“These other dog parks are not hikeable really. They are just a space, so I would like to wait until we can work out Dr. Crompton’s thoughts and see if we can maybe trade instead of just closing it,” she said.
Regarding if additional enforcement was necessary in the parks, the council agreed to revisit the idea if there are calls being recorded with residents expressing safety concerns with the dogs in Lick Creek; or elsewhere where they are not on a leash. Cunha suggested that the parks department keep a track when or if calls arise.
Councilman Bob Brick noted that Lick Creek Park used to be designated as a wildlife conservation area and wanted to see what could be done about the wildlife in the park and how they are affected.
Mayor Karl Mooney concluded the council’s discussion and remembered how many of the city’s parks used to be empty and are now filled with patrons.
“We have a considerable amount of land that is now park space. I would like to look at not just Smith Tract but some of those other areas where somebody could take their dog and put them off leash somewhere; I am hoping that we can see that,” Mooney said.
