Leashless Dogs Have Their Day : ‘This is Dogdom--dogs rule here,’ says a regular of Laurel Canyon Park, where people bring pooches who yearn to run free. Area neighbors call it an intrusion. But for the moment, dog owners prevail.

Dogs again roam free, beyond the reach of leash or chain, at Laurel Canyon Park. Life there is calm now, the way it used to be.

On a typical Saturday afternoon, choruses of crickets sing from the hills above the park and the winds this time of year can blow cold up the canyon from the city below. Dogs, 40 or so at a time, play in packs or pause alone to sniff at scattered, winter-barren trees or dash off suddenly, madly, across four acres of lawn.

For years this park, hidden just below the spine of Mulholland Drive in the Santa Monica Mountains above Studio City, has been known as a haven from Los Angeles’ leash laws, a place where dog owners from all over the city could set their pets free for an hour or two.

And that had brought bad, angry times to Laurel Canyon Park. Neighborhood residents complained to the city that the place had been overrun by dogs.

Battle lines were drawn between dog owners and the Los Angeles Animal Regulation Department. Animal regulation officers regularly raided the park, writing hundreds of $46 tickets and, occasionally, making arrests. Dog owners claimed harassment. There were protests and counter-protests. There were heated City Council debates over what should be done.

The problem still hasn’t been resolved, at least not officially. In September, 1985, the City Council voted to establish experimental leash-free areas in Los Angeles parks and the Recreation and Parks Department subsequently recommended Laurel Canyon Park as a pilot site. The program has been dormant for over a year, awaiting funding.

In the meantime the anger, the citations and protests have faded away. Animal regulation officers rarely visit the park anymore. Dog owners continue to let their pets off the leash. Neighborhood residents have resigned themselves to fight their battle quietly, through meetings with politicians.

The dogs reign over Dog Town.

So on a weekday afternoon, or anytime Saturday and Sunday, a quartet of Dobermans can prance freely through the center of the park. A convention of retrievers, terriers and mutts can congregate at a mud puddle, away from the humans. The dogs can run, bark and howl oblivious to owners’ cries of “Sammy, get out of there,” or “Bruno! Get the ball!”

“Look at all these dogs out here,” said Denise Zimmer, who had driven up the hill from Hollywood with her dogs Peaches, Remington and Kizzie. “They’re like kids. They love it.”

It can be an amazing sight at first--some 40 or 50 dogs running wildly in this one, small place.

And lest the scene appear idyllically playful, animal regulation officials warn that it is also potentially dangerous. With so many different breeds of dogs put together, and in such numbers, the dogs are bound to fight. And, they say, someday a dog is going to bite someone.

There have been complaints of children being knocked over by running dogs and of dogs ruining picnics. But the Animal Regulation Department has not heard of any reports of dog bites at the park, said Robert Rush, the department’s general manager.

Over several weekends last month, the dogs played peacefully. There were isolated standoffs, a couple of fights that were quickly broken up by owners.

“This is perhaps one of the happiest parks in the city,” said canyon resident Tom Kelley, who visits every day with his Doberman, Ginger. “It’s one of the parks that is truly used.”

If you watch just one dog over the course of an afternoon, it will periodically play with other dogs and then run on its own. Packs of dogs form and quickly dissipate. Some dogs remain at one end of the park, others move about. And there are the “runners,” the dogs that tear off across the field for no apparent reason. These dogs attract the “chasers,” who for some reason pursue the “runners” playfully growling and barking.

Harmony Not Unusual

Such harmonious demeanor shouldn’t be surprising, said Leslie Larson Cooper, a resident at the Veterinary Teaching Hospital of the University of California, Davis. She specializes in animal behavior.

“It’s something that hasn’t been studied, but I’ve run into a number of cases where dogs were more aggressive on leash than off leash,” Cooper said. “They aren’t so territorial.”

Both Cooper and animal regulation officers agree that dogs who are taken to the park regularly are usually well behaved.

“The kind of dog that goes there is a socialized dog used to that kind of thing,” Rush said.

And playing freely with other dogs may be beneficial to a dog’s mental and emotional well-being.

“Dogs are gregarious,” Cooper said. “They are pack animals and they like to be with their own kind.”

Indeed, the dogs tend to ignore the humans at Laurel Canyon Park.

Occasionally an owner will be called upon to operate the special “doggie” water fountain at the park or clean up after his or her pet with “pooper scoopers” provided at the park’s entrance.

Frisbees and Tennis Balls

Other times an owner will get up to throw a tennis ball or Frisbee for the dogs. There is one regular at the park, a man given to wearing sleeveless T-shirts, who has trained his pit bulls to fetch a five-foot section of two-by-four. None of the other dogs appear interested in this activity.

“This is doggie heaven,” said Janet Tinkle, a canyon resident.

Lisa Saks, of West Los Angeles, said that her Siberian Husky, Tasha, has come to expect weekly visits to the park.

“By Thursday, she lets me know that we’re getting close to the weekend,” Saks said. “She makes my life miserable until we finally get here. Then she sleeps all the way home.”

Not everyone is so enthused. Neighborhood residents and groups like the Committee for Laurel Canyon Park--which led a community effort to develop the park in the 1970s--resent the dogs’ presence. It is true that picnics, jogging and other human events are difficult to conduct with teams of dogs running in every direction.

Play Group Canceled

The Laurel Canyon Parents Assn. recently cancelled its Saturday play group at the park for parents and children, saying it feared for the children’s safety.

“We’re a small community and we’d like that park for our people,” said Pam Gelles, the association’s president.

Gelles wants the Animal Regulation Department to step up its enforcement of leash laws at the park. The last time that happened, in the spring of 1985, a pro-dog group called ParkWatch protested and the Animal Regulation Commission responded by ordering the department to halt its crackdown.

Rush insists that animal regulation officers have backed away from Laurel Canyon Park only because owners are complying with leash laws. But on the Saturdays and Sundays in February, no more than two or three dogs were leashed at any given time.

“I don’t think that anyone is kidding anyone by saying that things are getting better,” Gelles said. “Most of us wouldn’t mind a dog or two running around. But I’ve counted as many as 50 of them. And there are very few canyon people in there. Those are all people from Northridge and Santa Monica and Beverly Hills.”

Parent Group Quiet

Yet, the parent group has been the least vocal in this dispute. So the major combatants seem content to let things go as they are going for now.

“We’ve been living peacefully up at Laurel Canyon, so I really believe the problem is behind us,” said John Ward, an assistant general manager of the Recreation and Parks Department’s Valley region. “We don’t see it as a big problem at this time.”

There are 210,000 registered dogs in the City of Los Angeles, according to animal regulation records. Rush estimates there are another 40,000 unlicensed dogs. There are no places where dogs can run legally off leash.

San Francisco and Berkeley both have city-approved leash-free park areas. Berkeley’s Ohlone Dog Park was opened as an experimental site in 1981. Last year, the city’s residents voted by 2 to 1 to make it permanent.

“The results have been very good,” said Kathy Flood, supervisor of animal services in that city. “There has been one biting incident due to a dog fight and that person was not badly injured. We have more reports of bites because of dog fights in other areas of the city and with dogs on leashes.”

Los Angeles will have at least one area, probably Laurel Canyon Park, as soon as City Council attends to the matter of funding.

“A start has got to be made somewhere. I can’t think of a better place to do it than Laurel Canyon Park,” said Jane Purse, the leader of ParkWatch.

Dog Run on Hold

Plans for the installment of a dog run--a certain area of park designated as leash-free--at the park were put on hold because the Recreation and Parks Department’s proposal for a pilot program reached City Council at a time when district reapportionment was a pressing matter.

The park had been part of Councilman Joel Wachs’ district. Wachs consistently opposed turning Laurel Canyon Park leash-free. After reapportionment, Councilman Mike Woo received Laurel Canyon. He plans to meet with parties on both sides of the debate in March and report back to the council, according to Eric Shockman, a senior deputy for the councilman.

“It’s a very difficult question when it’s put to us as children vs. dogs,” Shockman said. “It’s almost like being asked to play a Solomon role of where to split the child.”

Rush said that while animal regulation officials agree with the need for leash-free areas, he foresees problems at such parks.

“They have to be policed, cleaned,” Rush said. “You have to develop a more responsible dog owner.”

At the park in Berkeley, a dog owners association quickly sprang up.

“I was skeptical at first,” Flood said. “But these people basically police themselves. They clean up after their pets and try to limit aggressive dogs. They have raised funds to plant trees and put in some garbage containers.”

At Laurel Canyon Park, ParkWatch has similarly provided the “pooper scoopers” for park visitors. Most owners there are quick to break up any possible fights. Some are diligent about using the “pooper scoopers,” others are not. On a recent Saturday, Bob Schlesinger and Linda Glick, who have been coming to the park for nine months, argued playfully over whose turn it was to clean up after Shane-ah-roo, her Akita.

“Most of the people who come here are law-abiding citizens,” said Kelley. “The people are protective about this park.”

A Special Society

An interesting form of society has grown up around these people. Like the dogs, some owners stand off by themselves, at the edges of the park, while others congregate in clusters near picnic tables or benches. As always in this park, dogs come first.

“We know each other by our dog’s names. We talk about dog things,” Saks said. “It’s a major step to introduce yourself by name.”

While human activities are a rarity at the Laurel Canyon Park, there are those who come with other than canine-involved motives.

Johan Denecke, 17, lives just up the road and brings friends to kick a soccer ball around.

“If you’re playing ball, it’s fun meeting dogs you don’t know,” Denecke said. “I’ve never been afraid of dogs here. You know they’re friendly or else they wouldn’t be here.”

In one corner of the park there is a play area for children: swings and jungle gyms and sand. It is enclosed by chest-high fencing and a gate that is kept closed. Marti Ivey, who lives in Sherman Oaks, stopped by the park for the first time one afternoon with her sons Justin, 3, and Damon, 2. She was a bit taken aback by all the dogs.

“It’s a beautiful park,” she said. “I’m just glad that there’s a fence.”

At that moment, Damon escaped through the gate and ran toward a gathering of dogs. Ivey ran after him: “You better come here. One of those dogs might get you.”

Chasing and Giggling

Larry Rapaport takes his 2-year-old son, Christopher, right out into the middle of the park. Christopher giggles and chases after the dogs.

“There are other parks we can go to if he wants to play,” Rapaport said. “He comes here to watch the dogs.”

Tinkle is there with her child, as well. She also brings her sheep dog. Although she is a member of the Laurel Canyon Parents Assn. and a friend of Gelles’, Tinkle isn’t quick to take sides on the battle over the park.

“I’ve been a mother for five years and a dog owner for 13 years,” she said. “I think we can all live harmoniously.”