Livingston Wins $25 K Grant For New Dog Park

Livingston has been named a grant recipient to help build a new dog park.

The city applied for the Boyd Foundation Dog Park Dash Grant. Downtown Revitalization Chairman Ray Evans said the non-profit announced Livingston as one of the 15 to win $25,000.

“The location is a one acre site that is part of the former shirt factory property,” Evans said. “It has been suggested that we call this facility ‘Central Bark’  since it is in such close proximity to Central Park.”

The proposed site is bounded by South Church Street, Railroad Street and South Spring Street.

Evans said the first step is to schedule a check presentation of the grant. Evans said after that, an agreement would be brought to the Mayor and Board of Aldermen to accept. Evans said a discussion will be required on city funding since the grant will not cover the full cost.

‘We’ll discuss how we would handle the overages and costs, but I can tell you that we would do that through our state shared sales tax revenue that we get each year from the state to reinvest,” Evans said.

A main factor in receiving this grant was community participation, and Livingston residents answered the call. Evans said several residents submitted responses to the foundation.

“We posted on social media a request of if you are in support of the dog park, send a message to the Boyd Foundation indicating so,” Evans said. “I can nearly count 100 responses, so it was a wonderful response.”

Evans said a combination of city workers and contractors would conduct the work similarly to how Central park was built.