WILLIAMSTOWN, Mass. — The Select Board on Monday was told that it should let the people who walk their dogs in the Spruces Park decide how the 114-acre town-owned park is managed.

 

A resident who self-described as a representative of "dog park parents and their little friends" told the elected officials that her feelings were hurt because it appeared the board was not paying enough attention to an email she drafted on the issue of whether to designate areas of the park available for off-leash dogs and require leashes in other areas.

 

"Our bottom line, as I put in my email this morning, was: Bike trail for leash, everything else off-leash," Avie Kalker told the Select Board. "And everyone who wants to walk on the grass and the fields and roam through the corn fields knows that this is the off-leash area and that dogs, for the most part, are trained.

 

"We're responsible people."

 

Monday marked the latest in a series of meetings during which the board has discussed whether and how to regulate use of the park by domestic animals and their owners.

 

The issue started to percolate in the spring of 2023, when a member of the board brought an bylaw proposal to the May town meeting by way of citizens' petition that would have amended the town's bylaw to require dogs to be leashed when not on an owner's property in the General Residence zoning district — which includes the Spruces Park.

 

This winter, the Select Board focused on the park itself, land that the town acquired about a decade ago under terms of a Federal Emergency Management Agency grant to close the flood-prone mobile home park on Main Street.