In recent years the city has opened up seven different city parks as “off leash dog parks”.  These canine recreation areas have been immensely popular with the dog loving populace of the city.

The city is now considering a pilot program for “off rein horse parks”.  Says Carol Stapleton of the Parks & Recreation Dept. “We’ll start with one park, most likely Cold Springs.  Once any kinks are worked out we hope to expand the program to parks across the city.”

While Newton isn’t known as horse country, there are quite a few horses in some of the neighboring towns to the west.  The city hopes to attract horses from the entire metro-West region.  Says Stapleton “it would be a win-win.  The city would get the revenue from the permits, our citizens would get the treat of seeing these majestic creatures galloping freely through our parklands, and best of all they’ll generate a bounty of free composting material for city residents”.