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VOLUSIA COUNTY COUNCIL

No! No! Volusia County rejects dogs on beach

By Andrew Gant
andrew.gant@news-jrnl.com



Published: Thursday, January 23, 2014 at 2:15 p.m.

Last Modified: Thursday, January 23, 2014 at 2:17 p.m.




The debate on opening Volusia County’s entire beach to dogs has ended, and the answer is no.



A test plan to at least temporarily allow leashed dogs on all of Volusia’s beaches failed Thursday in a discussion that touched on parasites, bites and potential confrontations between dog owners and the people who’d rather use the beach without them.

“We’re trying to redevelop ourselves; we’re trying to up our standards,” Councilman Doug Daniels, who had always opposed the idea, said toward the end of a two-hour debate. “We’re not trying to go backwards.

“You would have a steaming heap of dog excrement for your next tourist to step on and have it ooze between his toes,” Daniels vividly described later. “What is he going to tell people back home? That is not a good picture.”

Two weeks ago, the council voted 6-1 to draft a test ordinance that would allow leashed dogs everywhere on the beach for up to three months. Daniels was opposed. On Thursday, after hearing concerns from the health department, the federal government and a line of coastal Volusia residents, the vote switched to 5-2 against.

County Chair Jason Davis and Councilman Josh Wagner, who proposed the plan and has been pursuing the issue for five years, were on the losing end.

The county itself had been preparing to implement the program, although it was bound to be difficult to enforce. County Manager Jim Dinneen said enforcement would be strict anytime someone was caught not cleaning up after a dog or letting it run unleashed. The county suggested a fine of at least $50 with no warnings.

Several council members didn’t want to turn Volusia’s beach officers into a puppy patrol. “Unless we’re willing to be known as the dog gestapo down there… I don’t think that’s a direction we want to go,” Councilwoman Deb Denys said.

Volusia’s health director Dr. Bonnie Sorensen also recommended against the idea, raising flags about hookworms and round worms and the potential for rabies. A local veterinarian, Judith Milcarsky, brought a large glass jar containing a fatal parasite recently discovered to infect raccoons in Florida. She said it could spread to dogs, too, then offered to hand the jar to the council. No one wanted near it except Daniels, who took it and closely examined the creature, then left it sitting on the dais for the rest of the morning.

A dog-beach supporter, Halifax Humane Society director Miguel Abi-Hassan, said that parasite has only infected 25 people in the entire country and suggested some of the health concerns were overblown.

The U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service had already come out against the proposal based on its potential impacts on shorebirds and sea turtle nests.

The vast majority of residents who showed up Thursday were against it, too. Diane Carney of New Smyrna Beach said she goes to the beach to relax, not to witness “sniffing, fighting, defecating and romping around.”

Harry Beck of Daytona Beach said dogs have access to enough public places: “Do they have to be on the beach? I just don’t understand it. I think we ought to think a little bit about the humans. How about the humans who want to go out there for a nice, quiet walk?”

Councilwoman Pat Northey said she changed her mind on the issue when she learned that Volusia’s other two dog-friendly beach areas — Smyrna Dunes Park and Lighthouse Point Park — are actually officially dog-friendly by law, and not just loosely enforced zones. She said she might support adding a dog-friendly area to the beach near Bicentennial Park up near Ormond Beach. The votes weren’t there.












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