POTSDAM - The Potsdam Community Dog Park will hold an Animal-Themed Trivia Night fundraiser on Saturday, April 27 from 7-9 PM at The Lobster House in Norwood as their first in-person fundraiser since COVID.

“While we are volunteer-run and led, we do have costs that go beyond volunteer work like providing waste bags, waste removal, plowing, mowing, and insurance, and occasional but necessary costs like professional storm clean-up and repairs that all add up to around $6000/year,” says Deborah Massell, one of the founders and current president of the board for the Potsdam Community Dog Park.

The roughly three-acre park has areas for smaller and larger dogs and is populated daily with happy and active dogs and their owners. It is located behind the property on Madrid Avenue in Potsdam owned by the Potsdam Humane Society. The first fenced area created was just for their shelter dogs and they still use it daily.

The beautiful park was originally conceived for Massell’s dog who needed a place to run and meet friends after playing in parks all over the northeast. It took five years of continuous fundraising and discussions with the Potsdam Humane Society and Village of Potsdam to open, as well as clearing the land of all the tangled trees and undergrowth, and it’s been open from dawn until dusk every day to the public since October 2017.

A core mission of the park is to provide “a safe, off-leash, smoke-free, enriching environment for dogs and their people, creating a welcoming space that supports the network of animal lovers in the North Country region and beyond.”

The group has held regular fundraisers since opening to maintain the park and hosted a trivia night in 2019 that was a big hit. Besides a prize for the winning trivia team, there will also be a silent auction, 50/50 tickets, a wine pull, and more.

“We hope this event gets people excited about the dog park in addition to helping us raise money for its maintenance,” says Massell. “It has been really fun coming up with ideas for the questions, and they will amaze you as well as make you laugh!”

The Potsdam Community Dog Park is open to all spayed/neutered dogs at least four months old accompanied by their owners aged 16 or older. A full list of rules can be found on their site: https://www.potsdamdogpark.org/etiquette

As the Potsdam Community Dog Park looks to the future, they’d love to increase local awareness of the park as funds increase.

“We have incredible volunteers, and I’d like to introduce you to two: Megan posts regularly to our Facebook and Instagram pages and organizes the popular leashed Pack Walks on the Munter Trail,” says Massell. “And DeeDee has been great about helping us deal with all kinds of maintenance issues when North Country frost heaves do their worst. We really do have great volunteers who perform all sorts of tasks, but we could always use more… and so many people tell me they didn’t even know Potsdam had a dog park! So if you love dogs and have some time to give, please let us know!”

To register your team for the upcoming trivia night, visit https://tinyurl.com/dogparktrivia.

To learn more about the Potsdam Community Dog Park or make a donation, visit https://potsdamdogpark.org.