By Barb Shelly, Kansas City Star Editorial Page columnist

News, they told us in college journalism class, is whatever happens within a two-mile radius of your home. Or, better yet, within two miles of your editor’s home.

I’m not sure that holds true anymore, now that news is whatever is on one’s Facebook page, or cable channel, or Twitter updates.

But the news close to home still intrigues, and right now one of Kansas City’s strangest stories is playing out in my neighborhood. I speak of the great dog park controversy.

Would you believe this has been going on for almost three years? To recap: Some dog lovers went searching for an open spot where canines could run free. They set their sights on Sunnyside Park in the Waldo neighborhood. Some of the park’s neighbors objected.

Studies were initiated, task forces convened. A committee said Sunnyside Park would be a great site for a dog park. The staff and board of the city Department of Parks and Recreation disagreed.

The discussion turned snarly. Police were called to an impassioned meeting of the Board of Parks and Recreation Commissioners. Attorney Arthur A. Benson II, he of school desegregation fame, threatened to sue on behalf of the pro-dog-park contingent.

Here I should pause to disclose that Sunnyside is my favorite area park. It’s a lovely swath of green that already has a variety of uses — baseball fields, basketball courts and a spray pool. This time of year, it’s a glorious spot for a game of tennis, though you’ll want to take a broom to sweep the acorns off the courts.

So I stand with the neighbors who would prefer not to shoehorn a 3.5-acre fenced pooch playground into the mix.

The parks department has come up with a great alternative — South Oak Park, a couple of blocks away at 83rd and Main streets. An ample unused part of the park would be a fine place for canines to romp.

But getting the pro-Sunnyside team to accept another site has been about as do-able as extracting a t-bone from the jaws of a German shepherd.

If some of the combatants are showing signs of wear and tear from the prolonged fight, I didn’t see it this week when everyone convened at the Waldo Library to look at sketches for proposed dog park locations.

“It’s been fun,” said Eula Inloes, president of the Here’s Waldo Neighborhood Association. “When the mayor comes to your house and tries to intimidate you, it’s so much fun to intimidate him back.”

Inloes, a senior citizen and Chihuahua owner who opposes a dog park at Sunnyside, said Mayor Mark Funkhouser showed up at her house and tried, in an overbearing way, to get her to change her mind. Of course, she wouldn’t.

Funkhouser told The Star he was nice to Inloes and simply tried to break the deadlock. He hasn’t really offered a satisfactory explanation for why he supports the Sunnyside location in opposition to his own parks board, or why this matter warrants personal mayoral attention.

Deb Hipp, the driving force behind a Sunnyside dog park, was still holding out hope, noting it would have ample parking, could get underway quickly and would cost a lot less than building a dog park at South Oak.

But the parks department and board are standing firm, and Hipp allowed that a South Oak dog park would be “better than nothing.”

So perhaps the great dog park controversy is winding down. Or maybe not. The parks department says it’s committed to establishing an off-leash dog area in every City Council district. Ah, the prospects for conflict multiply.

The length and furor of this fracas seem illogical. Dogs and owners are entitled to their own exclusive share of parkland? Since when?

But at another level, the struggle is about community, and people’s passions for their parks and neighborhoods. In any case, it’s news. And it’s close to home.

Editorial board member Barbara Shelly can be reached at or 816-234-4594. She blogs at voices.kansascity.com