Berkeley Park

Admittedly, a very parochial post, but something that I feel is important (sent to the North Denver Tribune):


Helen Hu’s, “Dog Park still in pilot stage,” provides some comments from a Sunnyside resident (I really don’t know how you find these folks!) who suggests that, “If you eliminate the dog park, you’ll have an area that I wouldn’t want my kids to run around in.”

Okay. Fine. So, I guess this person is for the dog park. I mean, lordy, we couldn’t have her kids running around amidst the leavings of dogs, albeit those leavings are very responsibly tidied-up by the dog owners themselves. But, then, no, we are told that this Sunnyside resident doesn’t understand why we need dog parks in the first place. “…what did they do before the dog parks?” she wonders, apparently assuming all dogs have yards at home in which to run free. She then, according to Hu, questions the cost of fences and maintenance for the dog park in consideration of a tight city budget.

You know, being unmarried and childless (except for Sweet Melissa who is a four-legged, precocious and demanding child), I don’t question the enormous amount of city funds that are expended to keep Ms. Hu’s Sunnyside resident and her children happy in our parks: soccer fields, swimming pools, tennis courts, basketball courts, arts and crafts programs at recreation centers and, of course, the list goes on and on. You know, I don’t even resent my property taxes going to the Denver Public School system where, I assume, this Sunnyside resident’s children are being educated.

I do wonder, however, about a few other things that I’ve noticed during my daily – 365 days a year – visitation to Berkeley Park where a wonderful and intensely utilized dog park is situated. I wonder if Ms. Hu’s Sunnyside resident ever gives a moment’s concern to the used prophylactics that – especially during the spring and summer – litter the parking areas of the park and, indeed, are left within the spread of the great and ancient spruce and pine trees that grace the great lawns of Berkeley? I wonder if Ms. Hu’s Sunnyside resident ever becomes concerned about the plastic bottles and Styrofoam containers; Taco Bell, McDonalds and Burger King paper sacks that have been thrown into and remain on the surface of the lake – mostly along the southern shore? I wonder if Ms. Hu’s Sunnyside resident’s children have ever picked up a used hypodermic needle, beer or whiskey bottle which has been left alongside a picnic table or next to the trunk of a tree or in one of the parking lots of Berkeley? I wonder if Ms. Hu’s Sunnyside resident has ever noticed the deep gouges of someone’s SUV in the Berkeley lawns because, wow!, wouldn’t it be cool to jump the curb and do wheelies on the grass of the park?

May I be so bold as to suggest that dogs and their owners are not responsible for what I believe to be the obscene misuse of Berkeley Park? May I be so bold as to suggest that Ms. Hu’s Sunnyside resident should understand that the wonderful dog enclosure at Berkeley is somehow a civilizing entity for the park; is a place, a wonderful place, where folks treasure the simple pleasures of life which, by the way, include experiencing a dog run against the wind to grab a ball or a stick; which include the care, the meticulous care that dog owners take to assure the dog enclosure remains safe, clean and healthy for their loved ones, their dogs.

One can only hope that Ms. Hu’s Sunnyside resident would become more concerned about the harm, the disgusting harm human beings inflict upon Berkeley Park rather than the possibility one of her precious wards might step in a pile of... Well, you get the point.