‘WoofieLeaks’ is the latest salvo in an intense fight over dogs on public land
GOLDEN Gate National Recreation Area boasts 80,000 acres of beaches, rugged trails and towering redwoods in the San Francisco Bay area. Each year, 15 million people visit it to go kite-boarding, surfing, hiking, horseback-riding and dog-walking.
But only one of those activities has sparked a battle between some park- goers and federal officials. It’s the one that involves dogs - and it recently reached new, Julian Assange-inspired levels of intensity.
Dog owners have been fighting the National Park Service for years over a proposal to restrict dog-walking within the recreation area. Recently, one of the groups opposed to the new rules upped the ante, filing Freedom of Information Act requests for Park Service emails about the plan and posting them this month on a website.
Naturally, they called the site “WoofieLeaks.”
According to Save Our Recreation, the pro- dog group that created WoofieLeaks, the FOIA- ed communications show Park Service bias against dog enthusiasts. They also include evidence that personal email accounts were used for official business. And they definitely show the use of some less-than-professional language in internal communications. But all in all, the revelations are pretty far from the sort that got “House of Cards” character Zoe Barnes pushed in front of a train.
Still, the “leaks” – which weren’t really leaks but formally released documents - appear to have made an impact. Officials with the recreation area announced this month that implementation of the new dog-walking rules would be delayed indefinitely. The Park Service also is planning an investigation.
“We are in the process of identifying a team to review whether the use of personal email may have affected the planning and rule-making process for the GGNRA Dog Management Plan,” said Park Service spokesman Thomas Crosson.
Today, 7.2 miles of the recreation area’s 8.8 miles of beaches are open to dogs; the new plan would reduce that number to 2.8 miles. Dogs would be permitted on 47 of the area’s 137 miles of hiking trails, a step down from the current range of 63 miles. The proposal also shrinks the amount of space where dogs can roam off leash, according to the news site SF Gate.
Controversy over emails and bias aside, the park does have some legitimate concerns about dogs. It is home to some 3,900 plant and animal species, 37 of which are threatened or endangered. Some of these may be negatively affected by freeranging Fidos, such as mission blue butterflies, red-legged frogs, snowy plovers and San Francisco garter snakes. And while no one has formally studied dog interaction with these species, there is evidence that where dogs are allowed to roam leashfree, wildlife activity decreases. (Other research suggests that the impact may be minimal.)
University of Oxford researcher Joelene Hughes said no one would dispute that dogs sometimes chase wild animals.
“As someone who has always had pet dogs and knows how important good exercise is for their welfare, I think off-leash areas are vital,” said Hughes, who conducted a review on the topic in 2013. “But that it disturbs wildlife is undoubted.”
Of course, the kerfuffle in California is also about trying to accommodate myriad visitor groups, said Nathan Hale Sargent, a public affairs specialist for the Park Service. You have people who want to enjoy the outdoors with their pets but also families with young children who want a dogfree beach experience. Some equestrians also prefer trails where they know their horses are less likely to be spooked by dogs. “What’s driving us is a need to be a park for everyone,” he said. — WP-Bloomberg