A grass-roots campaign to build a dog park in Toledo’s Point Place neighborhood is gaining momentum.

The idea to add an off-leash dog playground at Detwiler Park struck Joe Beaufait, a retired resident of 112th Street, as he was walking one of his three dogs in the park in late May or early June and his arthritic knee began paining him.

“If you look at this park, it’s a nice park,” he said. “It’s beautiful, but it’s just not being used. If it wasn’t for the golf course, no one would be here.”

Mr. Beaufait proposed the idea on a Facebook page for Point Place and was inundated with supportive responses. So he contacted Toledo City Council members to pass the idea along.

“All I wanted to do was make the city aware of it, and let them know they could do this,” he said. “I just wanted to give them some information and the idea, that they can do something. I have a lot of people telling me to keep going.”

He created a Facebook group, “Starting a Dog Park in Point Place,” and gained 101 members in a single day. The group now has more than 200 members.

The Glass City Dog Park in Woodsdale Park off the Anthony Wayne Trail on the city’s south side has been a resounding success since it opened nearly a year ago. The membership-based park operated by the nonprofit group Toledo Unleashed has more than 600 members.

“Having more dog parks in our city is a good thing,” President Tina Yoppolo said. “We are absolutely supportive and we’re ready and willing to help any way we can.”

Ms. Yoppolo said the nonprofit is unable to take on another project at this point as it is still working out kinks and fine tuning the Glass City Dog Park, but will help Mr. Beaufait in other ways.

Mr. Beaufait’s initial idea was to fill in the old Detwiler Pool that closed in 2010 after thieves stole plumbing fixtures and authorities determined it was too expensive to renovate. The current thinking is to use the land around the pool’s former parking lot.

Toledo City Councilman Lindsay Webb, who represents District 6, which includes Detwiler Park, is on board with Mr. Beaufait’s idea and is helping him formulate plans. She said that land is virtually unused and has amenities including the parking lot and an adjacent walking trail.

“It has a kind of natural area to separate large dogs from small dogs too,” she said. “It’s a great site.”

Mr. Beaufait also is looking to name the dog park in memory of Toledo Police K-9 Falko, a the first Toledo police dog to be killed in the line of duty. 

Falko was shot in the face Aug. 12 while attempting to apprehend a suspect in the crawl space of a vacant home on Earl Street.

Ms. Webb said the city is open to Mr. Beaufait’s idea and would be willing to assist as it did with the Glass City Dog Park, but likely would not be willing to take on the expense of building, maintaining, or operating the park.

To that end, Mr. Beaufait plans to talk to an attorney this month about how to form a nonprofit organization, essentially replicating Toledo Unleashed’s process, and has started an online fund-raising page at gofundme.com/​z233jenw.

The Point Place Business Association and Visions of Cullen Park have both voiced support for the initiative. Ms. Webb said fund-raising will be the group’s biggest challenge. Just $250 of the $50,000 goal has been raised so far.

“There’s a core group of very active people who are committed to seeing this come to fruition,” she said. “But they aren’t necessarily connected.”

Mr. Beaufait admits that’s the case and that he didn’t intend to become the leader of the initiative, but that’s how things have worked out thus far and he plans to continue.

“I am not a political guy. I’m not an activist,” he said. “I’m just a guy who had an idea, and I think it could work.”

Contact Alexandra Mester: amester@theblade.com, 419-724-6066, or on Twitter @AlexMesterBlade.

First Published September 8, 2015, 4:00 a.m.