At Thursday night’s City Commission Work session, commissioners heard from Kim Perez with Friends of the Hays Dog Park. The group is asking the Commission’s permission to begin work on the dog park in an incremental manner and would like to complete what they are calling Phase I of the dog Park in hopes that the completion of this portion of the larger project will assist in their fundraising efforts.

“It’s Great when citizens care enough to take initiative to change the community positively,” Mayor Kent Steward told Eagle News.

“The group had said that they would  pay for everything if the city would set aside land but the task was more than they expected and fundraising is uncertain”. Perez agreed two years is enough time to raise money but the fundraising is slow so now they want to build in phases.

Commissioner Ron Mellick expressed concern that construction could start and not be completed. Perez wrote on the Friends of the Dog Park Face Book Page, “ Couple of the commissioners had some concerns about a phased approach for the Hays dog park. PLEASE contact them in the next week and let them know that you think it is a good idea! Please! If they allow us to do a phased approach, I really think we could be playing in a dog park within the year!!!”

“When they started the dog park people said small dogs and big dogs shouldn’t be put together, said Steward. “Now they want to start building and they say they will combine both small and big dogs. It seems like they have contradicted themselves.”

In other work on Thursday evening, Commissioners asked to have the newly seeded lawn permits on the agenda for next week where they will vote on it. The discussion was positive and they were supportive of the proposed changes.