WAG Race benefits dog park pond expansion

Nearly 500 runners and their four-legged friends participated in the fifth annual WAG Race on Sunday to benefit the Whitefish dog park.

While the finally tally is still being calculated, the record turnout will likely have raised about $2,000 for the park, WAG president Jim Lockwood said.

All the money raised will go toward an expansion of the park’s pond.

Plans call for enlarging the pond to be three times its current size. The entire area will be landscaped and limestone rocks will encircle the pond’s edge.

“It will be a nice place for dogs and people,” Lockwood said. “There won’t be a nicer dog park in the country when it’s done.”

Crews will empty the pond in early June, excavation work is set to start in July, and the project should wrap up by early September.

Lockwood says nearly all of the $118,000 needed for the pond project has been secured through donations, pledges and $25,000 from the city’s resort tax fund. About $50,000 worth of labor is being donated.