What was once their domain now belongs to the city of Oldsmar, which wants to make the strip more family friendly.
By AARON SHAROCKMAN
Published November 16, 2003
OLDSMAR - Man's best friend has been shooed off the beach.
And since Fido can't get anyone's attention at Oldsmar City Hall, some local pet owners are barking on his behalf.
"All it has ever been is a place for people to take their dogs," said Sue Vale, a city dog owner. "Now the city wants to turn it into Clearwater Beach. Well, we already have plenty of those. We need somewhere for our dogs."
The city's decision to keep animals off a 150-yard stretch of beach in the Mobbly Bayou Wilderness Preserve has angered about 35 residents who regularly use the area for their pets.
Now they're organizing. Last week, they marched en masse to the city's Parks and Recreation Advisory Board meeting and asked for answers. Unsatisfied, they'll start a petition to keep the dogs on the beach.
Vale said someone would also address the City Council at its meeting Tuesday.
"This is the beach that's been referred to for 30-40 years as Dog Beach," Vale said. "It's the only place you don't have to worry about neighbors, or houses or traffic."
The beach, which sits on a 14-acre property at the end of Shore Drive E at the tip of Safety Harbor, had been privately owned until April 2001, when the city and county purchased it for $900,000 and expanded it into the 200-acre Mobbly Bayou Wilderness Preserve.
Since then, pets have not been allowed on the property, said Lynn Rives, the city's Parks and Recreation director.
But until recently, the rule was not enforced.
Rives said his office fielded "several" complaints from beachgoers in the past two months, prompting more active policing.
"There have been people that called the sheriff's department, they've called me," Rives said. "They say that these pets are loose, and that they're using the beach as a bathroom."
Frank Piccione was with his grandchildren last month when a roaming dog urinated on a tree right next to them. Piccione, 62, who lives two houses north of the preserve entrance, wrote a letter to Oldsmar Mayor Jerry Beverland asking Pinellas County sheriff's deputies to enforce the no pet policy.
Piccione said he's fighting to keep the beach clean for his grandchildren and the bay clean for everyone to enjoy. They are the same reasons the city and county decided to ban horses from the preserve's wetlands, Piccione said.
"I can't stand on my dock and go to the bathroom in the bay," Piccione said. "But yet for some reason, if dogs do it, it doesn't bother the city."
Vale, who has a 2-year-old beagle named Chloe, said the city could place waste bags on the beach for pet owners. The city could also remind owners they are responsible for cleaning up after their pets, Vale said.
But more at issue for the city is its hope to make the small beach family friendly. That idea doesn't include pets.
"The beach belongs to the city now and we want it to be a public beach," the mayor said.
Even Vale said she agrees unleashed dogs and small children don't mix. But she suggests kicking out the kids, not the chihuahuas.
"There are dozens of places where dogs can't go that children can," said Vale, 46. "There's plenty for children to do here. I know, I have three. This is the one place that we want to be able to take the dogs, let them run, let them swim."
The city is working on creating a fenced-in dog park somewhere in the preserve, probably in the North Support Area behind Bicentennial Park, Rives said. There are designated pet areas in all city parks, but no place fenced in where dogs are allowed to run without a leash, Rives said.
But a landlocked dog park won't allow a place for animals to swim, Vale said.
Beverland said the city might be able to designate a portion of the beach for just dogs, but Rives said the small size of the land makes it difficult. The beach is 150 yards long and about 30 yards deep. Of that, trees cover much of the area.
"It's not the type of beach where people swim and lay out," Vale said.
