Speech Is Not Free For Non-Residents At The Dog Park
To The Editor:
Last year the town turned away an acquaintance of mine and her dog at the dog park because she doesn’t live in Newtown and doesn’t have a non-resident permit. That was wrong.
Parks are considered public forums where people are free to engage in constitutionally protected activities, regardless of where they’re from. Courts have ruled that restricting access to residents violates the federal and state constitutional guarantees of freedom of expression and freedom of association. They have also written that towns may charge non-residents a fee that covers the actual cost of the visit and no more. This is so the fee doesn’t limit who can use the park.
Newtown charges non-residents a yearly fee of $150 to use most of its facilities. There is, however, no lower fee to use just the dog park.
At the July 2020 meeting of the Parks and Recreation Commission a member of the Dog Park Committee expressed her concern over enforcing the prohibition against non-residents using the park when many of them had helped maintain it and some had even contributed money. The then Chairman asked the Director of Parks and Recreation to “gather information about [this] issue and to get back to the Committee and make some decisions.”
The record does not show that the Director got back to the Committee or that she made any decisions.
The same member of the Dog Park Committee said at the July 2021 Commission meeting that the $150 fee for non-residents to use just the dog park was not fair, and suggested charging those visitors a separate, lower fee. The new Chairman said the fee is used to offset the cost of maintenance paid by town residents through taxes but agreed to look into the issue. The record does not show that he did.
Charging non-residents $150 to use the dog park does more than just offset costs. It disproportionally shifts expenses to non-residents, resulting in non-residents who can’t pay the fee unable to use the dog park to exercise their first amendment rights. Surely, Newtown’s actual costs to accommodate a non-resident at the dog park are less than $150.
And then, at the March 2022 Commission meeting the Assistant Director of Recreation asked if non-residents could be charged a different fee for using just the dog park. In a breathtaking display of bureaucratic deflection the Chairman asked if issuing a separate permit would “make more work for the office staff.” Really? Is that the issue?
Why hasn’t the Commission changed its obviously unconstitutional policy toward non-residents who want to use only the dog park? Is it because [commissioners] don't know the law or is it that the Commission’s overriding interest is in maximizing revenue?
Perhaps both, but the latter seems more plausible.
Glen Swanson
Sandy Hook
Free quasi dog park at Fairfield Hills.
Can you provide a reference to a court case finding access to a town park was a violation of first amendment rights? I can’t imagine that is what our forefathers were anticipating. I actually think $150 is a very fair price. I realize that you are likely looking for a day pass situation which would certainly create a larger administrative burden. That cost could always be passed on, would you have thought $15 a day was reasonable?
I’m pretty sure there were no dog parks when our forefathers were thinking about the first amendment. But then there weren’t movies or the internet either.
See the 2001 Connecticut Supreme Court Case of Leydon v. Greenwich for a discussion of why parks are public places open to anyone and not just the residents of the town where the parks are located. On the issue of fees see Kempner v. Greenwich, a Federal District Court case.
The idea of a “larger administrative burden” is a red herring; for example, seventy-five non-residents buying a permit for the dog park spread out over the year would not add any significant burden to anyone. I don’t think the town’s cost of a visit to the dog park comes anywhere near $15.