On Tuesday, April 4, over 100 people gathered at the Fountain Hills Community Center to celebrate the 25th Anniversary of the Association of Dog Owners Group (ADOG) with a spaghetti dinner and an annual meeting.

ADOG was born in 1998 when a group of concerned dog owners came together to lobby the Town of Fountain Hills for land to create a permanent off-leash dog park. Without any other community dog parks in Arizona to pattern themselves after, the first ADOG members spent long hours researching dog parks throughout the country, culminating in the writing of a detailed “white paper” called “Report on Off-Leash Recreational Facility (OLRF) for Fountain Hills.” The report was presented to the Town Council for review and was approved in September 1998.

The Desert Vista OLRF was opened for business on Dec. 11, 1999, approximately 20 months after the establishment of ADOG, which was formally incorporated as a 501(c)(3) non-profit charity a few months later in March 2000. Recently, ADOG was named the official liaison between the Desert Vista Dog Park and the Town of Fountain Hills.

This long history culminated in the highlight of the April 4 annual meeting. festivities, including the presentation of the newly created Lifetime Achievement Award given to four of the original ADOG members, Morton “Mitch” Mitchell, Hilary Clinton, Hidemi Phillips and Chotzi Van Bemmel, all of whom were at that very first meeting 25 years ago that gave birth to ADOG and created the vision for a dog park.

Featured speakers for the celebration were Fountain Hills Superintendent of Parks, Kevin Snipes and Lieutenant Jonathan Halverson of the Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office. Snipes addressed the Town’s plans to upgrade the dog park in the near future including re-grading areas of the park where water collects, removing curbs and gravel where necessary and replacing rusted benches.

Lt. Halverson spoke at length to explain the enforceable dog park rules, the laws and ordinances which govern them and what actions can be taken when each is broken. He also explained that MCSO should be contacted first when an incident does occur. MSCO will then determine whether or not a report should be turned over to animal control or a separate code violation group for evaluation.

Judging by the number of new membership applications and renewals that were received during the event, the future looks bright for ADOG’s next 25 years.