By Pepper Parr
May 19th, 2020
BURLINGTON, ON
The dogs won.
City hall is working furiously to open leash-free dog areas and most City park parking lots by end of day on Friday, May 22, 2020.
Dogs have been waiting for months to be able to do this legally. City expects their owners to adhere to the six foot rule.
Toronto made the move – Burlington is feeling the pressure from the dog owner community – the plea from the city is to encourage everyone to follow public health directions and Provincial orders to physically distance themselves a minimum of six feet to help slow the spread of COVID-19.
The bylaw officers have had a very difficult time getting people to keep their dogs on short leashes and to not congregate – they clearly don’t understand dog owners and dog owners clearly don’t take all that well to bylaw.
There was one day last week when a reported seven tickets – with a potential $750 fine – were given out in a single day.
Not hard to figure why the guy in red is out for a walk.
All City-owned leash-free dog areas, parking lots and tennis courts are scheduled to be opened by end of day Friday, May 23 with the exceptions of:
1. The west parking lot at Spencer Smith Park (ongoing construction)
2. LaSalle Park Marina parking lot (ongoing construction)
3. Lowville Park parking lot (continued crowd management)
Residents are encouraged to leave their cars at home when visiting a park. Walk, bike or roll to your neighbourhood park.
City Multi-use Sports Fields
Congregating is lovely – just adhere to the six foot rule. Our failure to do that gives the virus opportunities to spread itself every where.
The Province announced today that multi-use sports fields (such as baseball diamonds and soccer fields) can be opened. Families can now enjoy our publicly accessible sports fields (areas not locked and enclosed with fencing) with members of their own household for casual play. Only family members from the same household are able to be within six feet of each other. The City of Burlington will provide further information regarding our sports fields by Friday, May 23.
In the meantime, organized group sports are still not permitted due to Provincial emergency orders. Requirements need to be in place by provincial sport organizations before permitted field use can be re-introduced. The City will work in collaboration with local sport organizations and as the specifics are provided, an implementation plan will be finalized.
Provincial emergency orders remain in effect that limit the number of people in a gathering to five. If sports fields are used for casual purposes they are to be used at resident’s own risk; the City has not maintained or inspected sports fields during the pandemic.
The number of infections in the Region are increasing regularly – that is because the virus is amongst us in the community and being passed from person to person. Don’t be the person that picks it up from someone else – maintain that six foot distance.
By Provincial order, park amenities, including all washrooms and playground equipment remain closed.
It looks pretty clear that we stopped flattening the curve a while ago, in steps and especially 10 days ago.
And the last 2 days, to May 18 in this graph, have accelerated this towards the exponential.
“Gone to the Dogs” you say?
Not funny.
Health Officials have indicated that 6 feet is the minimum distance and have discovered that 9 feet is optimum, especially if outdoors and it is a windy day.
For those residents that would like to protect themselves and others free fabric masks are being offered to those who cannot afford to buy them. Fabric masks have become somewhat of a fashion statement.
Please consider wearing a fabric mask when in public.
Since dogs can be COVID-19 carriers, this doesn’t seem like a good idea.