Ghan & Cooper open dog park in downtown Fort Smith

Fort Smith dogs have a new place to hang out and sniff and run when they accompany their owners to downtown Fort Smith thanks to a private park now planned for public use.

Squirrel Chase Dog park, located at Ninth and B Streets, is an effort by Ghan & Cooper to provide a new and fun amenity to the downtown area of Fort Smith.

“Our hope was to create a fun place for Fort Smith residents to hangout with their furry friends while also being able to enjoy Fort Smith’s downtown businesses and restaurants,” information from Ghan & Cooper about the dog park states.

Stuart Ghan, principal broker and partner at Ghan & Cooper Commercial Properties, said they came up with the idea of the dog park while considering their downtown residential properties. The company owns The Bricks at Brunswick as well as Brunwick Place, which has four apartments along with retail and office space, and manages other residential properties downtown.

“We were looking to add something unique as an amenity for our downtown residents and also something that could be used by people coming downtown to eat at the restaurants or go to the bars or whatever,” Ghan said.

The park is located in the downtown Fort Smith entertainment district, so people can bring their alcoholic beverages into the park while they are letting their dogs play. Ghan said they just ask that there is no glass.

Ghan & Cooper owned the three-fourths acre lot at Ninth and B streets and had been considering how best to develop it, when the idea materialized to turn it into a dog park, Ghan said. Squirrel Chase, Inc. was set up as a 501c3, so all donations to keep the park running are tax deductible, he said.

“We are not funded by the city or parks department in any way,” he said.

Mars Petcare supplied a fence for the new park, which allows it to be open to the public even though all the amenities are not yet purchased or in place, Ghan said. The 501c3 has created a Fundly page so individuals and businesses can donate to the park and help purchase animinties. The goal is to raise $20,000 for the park.

Some of the wanted amenities include a drinking fountain, which costs about $2,600; a $671 fire hydrant; a teeter totter with a roughly $1,400 price tag; a $1,600 dog crawl; a rover jump with an estimated cost of $1,300; and a King of the Hill ramp and dog walk ramp with a combined cost of about $8,600. Extra funds will go toward mowing and maintenance of the park, Ghan said.

“We hope you can give and help make this the most fun urban dog park in our area,” noted information on the park.

Major donors will be recognized on a sponsor board at the park, Ghan said. So far along with the fence donated by Mars Petcare, Taylor + Moore Architecture has supplied renderings of the park. Ghan & Cooper and the Ghan family also have donated to the park.

“We are very excited to open this up for our downtown,” Ghan said. “My company will be managing the park, and we are going to be as vigilant as possible in regard to vagrancy and the like to make sure we have the safest area as possible.”

For information, email [email protected], or call (479) 478-6161.