Cal Anderson’s grassy bowl (Image: CHS)
Complaints from a Capitol Hill mother of two about the population of people camping in Cal Anderson Park have the mayor’s office and the East Precinct’s attention. Now she just needs to get Seattle Parks in the game.
“There are a lot of families, and a lot of small children but sometimes the focus is not on the children. In some ways, they’re an invisible population,” advertising VP and busy Capitol Hill mom Laura Stockwell told CHS when we talked to her last week about her tweets to @mayormcginn and @seattlepd calling for more attention — and more policing — of what she says is a growing problem with homeless and other people hanging out and sometimes living in Cal Anderson this summer.
“Three people were sleeping in the playground. I heard a mom say ‘Don’t wake them up,'” Stockwell says of her decision that it was time to stop being nice and start asking for change.
“I had a woman say they were trying to use the bathroom and in the next stall somebody was shooting up.”
“Go find a family friendly place,” Stockwell said the mother was told.
“It’s gone from sharing the park to now I’m encroaching,” she says.
The result of Stockwell’s complaints has been a rapid response from East Precinct. According to operations head Lt. Joel Guay, his units already have increased their presence in Cal Anderson.
“It’s not that they’re there, it’s that they’ve overtaken it,” Guay said of the population of people who make the park their all-day and sometimes all-night hangout.
The precinct has asked its officers on patrol in the beat to check in on the park at least two times a shift and to do more than just drive by on 11th Ave — you should see more cops walking through or on bikes. Guay said part of the long-term plan is to simply make more contact with the people in the park and remind people that they’ll need to move along before the park’s official closing hour of 11:30p.
Guay said SPD had some requests for the Parks Department including increasing maintenance efforts for things like raking beneath bushes and shrubs where dangerous items like hypodermic needles might be discarded to keep the area more safe for children.
The East Precinct has also asked Parks to increase the presence of the city’s Park Rangers in Cal Anderson basically asking the department to deploy its Rangers to just be in the park more often.
Parks, at least in e-mail to CHS, wasn’t exactly receptive to the request:
Parks has received very few complaints about Cal Anderson Park. In the past three years, we have received one report of rats and one complaint about overflowing trash cans after an event. Parks’ security supervisor deploys the park rangers to Cal Anderson Park and other parks as he can. The rangers were hired to patrol in downtown parks as an element of a three-part effort to enliven them through physical changes, better security, and more programmed activity: http://www.seattle.gov/parks/downtown/, so that must be their focus. We do try to have them present at some events and situations where security may be an issue. They cannot routinely be at Cal Anderson Park.
As for the increased maintenance, Parks says after the ongoing reduction in budgets, there’s no money for increasing maintenance in Cal Anderson.
Parks also bristled at another idea being floated by East Precinct to deter camping out in Cal Anderson at night — increased use of sprinklers. The department representative we contacted said nobody has formally requested the sprinkler strategy be deployed but it wouldn’t work anyway because of Cal Anderson’s fancy irrigation system:
It is a state of the art computerized irrigation system installed in many parks. It measures how much water is needed at any given time and turns the irrigation sprinklers on and off at precise times, saving thousands of gallons of water per park each year. It operates only at night when the park is closed. The times are not predicable because of the sensors.
Beyond the intra-department squabbles about how to respond to complaints from those like Stockwell who feel that the park has taken a turn for the worse, the long-term story for the area is that is still much safer than it used to be.
Junkie kids present a dilemma. Just kidding, mom (Image: prima seadiva via Flickr)
In comparison to last summer, it’s not clear there is actually an increase in the number of homeless, panhandlers, skate punks, pit bull punks, druggies, junkies, meth heads, huffers and slackliners using the park.
One factor could be the closure of Bobby Morris for the replacement of its lighting system that has left the southern edge of the park encircled in chain link fencing that has pinched off some of the pedestrian activity in the area. There has also been a reduced schedule at the wading pool due to budget cuts that has cut down on park usage by families. And the seemingly neverending turf overhaul project also may have cut down on total pedestrian flow through the park.
But Stockwell who says she has lived on the Hill on and off since 1994 acknowledges this summer’s frustrations might be equally as much a product of her own growing family and their increased usage of the Hill and its resources.
In addition to her work to push for a safer Cal Anderson, Stockwell has also gotten involved with the design of the new FedRep Park which she was disappointed to find didn’t include any dedicated play elements for kids. She writes about both parks in this post to her Family Friendly Seattle blog.
Back at 11th and Pine, SPD would like to remind you of the bad old days of Pike/Pine to add a little perspective.
“Compared to the distant past,” Guay said, “the park is improved. I feel real good about the positive change we’ve been able to make over the time. People like Laura being real guardians and being real detailed about what they saw help quite a bit.”
Stockwell said one of her reports was an incident where a seemingly homeless man insisted on interacting with her three-year-old. “I leave them alone. I just want to be left alone. When I say don’t talk to my kid, I mean it,” Stockwell said. And this time she meant it enough to tweet the mayor — and eventually call his office — to ask for something to be done.
“Parks has received very few complaints about Cal Anderson Park. In the past three years, we have received one report of rats and one complaint about overflowing trash cans after an event.”
Seriously?! This needs to be remedied.
To file your own complaint:
24-Hour Maintenance Request Line: 206-684-7250
Graffiti Report Line: 206-684-7587
Illegal Camping: 206-684-CITY (Seattle’s Customer Service Bureau)
Online requests & feedback form:
http://www.seattle.gov/parks/contact/Form.asp
I personally stopped going to Cal Anderson this summer after having to coax a woman who was shooting up out of the only working bathroom stall so the line-up of women needing to go could GO! The rest of the bathroom was a mess… feces wiped all over the adjacent stall. No toilet paper in either. I didn’t complain then and am regretting it now! My plan is to wander through the park every day, pick something, and complain about it. Some thoughts:
(1) Bathroom conditions
(2) Squatters
(3) Broken equipment (lights, playground, etc)
(4) Non-functioning fountain (again?!)
(5) Blocked off grass areas (why is this taking so long!?)
(6) Found items (e.g. syringes, discarded clothing and encampment items)
(7) Graffiti on the big red wall
(8) Ugly art on the big red wall (I kid.)
(9) Overflowing trash bins
(10) People sleeping on the playground
I wonder if i begged Food Not Bombs hard enough if they’d start serving food up at Cal Anderson. If it brings my rent down to something more reasonable, i’m all for it.
That’s quite an altruistic purpose Traj. You can opportunistically use an organization that helps people, so that you can lower your rent. You know there’s likely a multi-millionaire that owns your building, but please continue your verbal assault on the middle-class people of the neighborhood. Do you ever get the feeling you’re angry with the wrong people?
I can’t really live if I were to live in/around fear.
Life’s worth more: I’d rather risk the knifing or whathaveyou and be a real vivacious human than curl up into a ball and avoid the real world merely in order to increase the chances of my age becoming a larger number than yours.
If “speaking up” truly got your knifed, then NYC (for one example) streets would be choked full of millions of stab victim corpses. (and as it is, they have the same violent crime rate as we do ( <800). Says something, no?)
I call BS on your “kids can just use their imagination” excuse against dedicated play areas.
If rocks and imagination are all that park patrons need, then we can forego the benches, the seating and the p-patch too, Josh. “Lively playtime” can be had by the dodgeballers & soccerplayers and tennis players in industrial parking lots too, I suppose? We should fill in Green Lake with sod and make it all lawn by that line of reasoning: that water’s been a pain in the ass for over a century now – we should just use our imaginations and “pretend” we’re swimming/boating.
And, By that logic, all the parks in the city should just be untouched open land / dirt / lawns!!
Or, if absense somehow makes the activity stronger, we should forego security and maintenance for the parks too, right? That would make our fellow comrades step up to do that work themselves, thus bettering the entire community?
Fie.
Note that the dept has “parks” and “recreation” in the title. This article/Laura gets points in my book because she actually understands that kids can’t vote bad policy / poorly run parks out of office – adults have to take responsibility for it – rather than blow it off or look for excuses -however rare actually proof might be to support such claims- on how we might benefit by what amounts to avoiding the issue.
“you want your own private little reserve, safe from anything that’s not disney/pollyanna, that fits your perfect little white-bread life?”
Oh for fuck’s sake. What they want is a park they can take their kids to without worrying about having do worry about stepping on needles or defending their kids from the raving drunk/mentally unstable.
If you want there to be a park, people have to use it. If you want people to use it, they have to be not scared to go there.
If you want a homeless camp, let’s just call it ‘The Jungle II’ and see what happens when we let ‘urban nature’ take its course.
Jesus I consider myself a liberal but you people are just the opposite of the fucking tea party. At least turn the argument into a campaign to get people the mental health or drug abuse counseling they need. Stop just blindly attacking and recognize the problem.
Jesus pearl-clutching Christ! Really? People avoid Cal Anderson for being too sleazy? You’re really afraid to pull out your cell-phone on Broadway and Pine? Half these comments, and the bellyaching of Mz. Stockwell included, belong on WhiteWhine.com. Gimme a break. Broadway is really not that scary.
I feel like I’m taking crazy pills.
If you find the conversation ridiculous, then extricate yourself from it. I find your handle ridiculous, “Winkie”. Fortunately for the rest of the people on the planet you’re not the final word on when people have been harassed in the park.
A few weeks ago I was at Cal Anderson around 9am on a Saturday with my small daughter. There were about 5 guys still sleeping on the field between the playground and the bathrooms. On our way between them, my daughter accidentally woke one of them up (ran nearby and stepped on something loud). The following exchange ensued:
Homeless Man (HM): “Why… what a lovely face to wake up to! ….what’s your name?”
My Daughter (MD): “Ummm… Hi! …my name’s __!”
HM: “Nice to meet you __, my name is __! How old are you?”
MD: “I’m two!”
HM: “Wow… two! And how are you today?”
MD: “I’m good – how are you?”
HM: “I’m good, too! Well, it’s nice to meet you – have a good day!”
MD: “Bye bye!”
Was I standing within a foot or two the entire time? Of course. Did I feel remotely threatened? No. My daughter, who is just learning “normal polite exchanges”, was totally thrilled. And I, who moved here from the midwest where ever other adult you meet in the street will have this kind of exchange with a random kid, was so struck by the fact that it was the guy sleeping under a blanket holding onto his one tattered backpack that in Seattle bothered to do so.
I actually live about a block and a half from Cal Anderson, and we go literally almost daily (sometimes twice in one day…!). In addition, I run through the park most mornings on my way to work. Yes, there are frequently homeless people there. But in my experience over the past >1 year, almost never have I felt remotely threatened – because there are almost always plenty of other people there, too. It’s the mix that’s both protective, and the beauty of the park. Tonight I passed a man so still while completely under a thick blanket that I paused to make sure I could see that he was breathing – and then spent most of the rest of my time next to a family grouping that was playing traditional Spanish music while their young daughter played with mine. We were also surrounded by other families with kids, frisbee throwers, the occasional you-mean-we’re-not-in-a-room?-making-out-couple, various picnickers and book-readers.
I can see why if there were someone sleeping actually in the playground area during any remotely normal waking-toddler hours, I would feel upset. I also am obviously very invested in there not being random used needles laying under bushes for my daughter to find. But, so far, I have not seen these things despite extensive time at the park. Not that I don’t believe that they have occurred to others, but in my experience they must not be THAT common yet. In fact, I have yet to find a single piece of broken glass on the playground (which I cannot say for most parks I frequent – or even our own shared-by-several-units backyard!). On the other hand, my daughter has exchanged pleasantries with at least a dozen pleasant homeless people so far over our year on Capitol Hill.
I think this is all a balance. Obviously, we need things to feel safe enough for lots of functional people to keep showing up at Cal Anderson, which in turn helps it keep feeling safe. So far, I think it’s hard to argue we haven’t mostly done that. And as long as we’re in that range, we’re balancing the good of having a diverse neighborhood against the fear of violence… the rights of all people, including the homeless, against the right of the people to enforce laws against eg drug use in the park or remaining in the park after “closing”… the benefits of additional police presence vs the alternate services that money could provide instead.
So far, I think the balance isn’t bad. But I’m glad to hear others’ experiences, too.
Police presence is one thing, but my friend was asked for his I.D. and made to stand in front of the cop car with his hands to his side like he had done something wrong. Is this even legal? If so, that means ANYONE could be stopped at anytime to “show there papers”! OUTRAGEOUS!
if you are on pins and needles walking up Pike in the middle of the day and have been too scared to ever enter Cal Anderson park, I’m having a hard time why you would even want to come to Capitol Hill. Have you ever been to a city with a real crime issue?
The only problem with that is that were not in another city dealing with their crime issues. We are talking about Seattle and the issues that exist here. There is no need to go off topic. Focus!
The parks are there for EVERYONE’s use; however the park is not meant to be lived in, vandalized, littered or generally abused. Those poor, unfortunate souls, can’t respect that and that’s what people have a problem with. That’s what pisses me off when I go to the park and can’t enjoy my time there. How often do you see moms and their kids drinking 40s on the grass, fighting, getting high or passed out on the grass? The homeless people pass through, leave a huge mess, often including vomit and urine and then expect people to be ok with that and get indignant when you have a problem with it.
I only have a problem with homeless people, yeah, I do, when they can’t behave themselves or control their dogs. I get it, I live in the city and the city is not sanitized, but come on. When I go to the park, I should also be able to enjoy my time there with out being subject to loud, vulgar language and profanities. I don’t want to see people pissing in the bushes because they’re too high or drunk to make it to a restroom.
I’m all for having more of SPD patrolling the parks so that EVERYONE can enjoy them.
I thought a parasite was something or someone who lives in or on something and derives benefits but doesn’t give anything back? I walk through Cal Anderson park all the time and see lots and lots of homeless people passed out on the grass or making a huge mess or vomiting in the grass or letting their dogs take a crap on the grass, but I never, ever seem them picking up trash or dog crap or taking a hose to the playground to clean it up or do anything to benefit the park. That sounds kinda parasitic. I’m just yuppie scum who lives in the neighborhood and pays taxes to keep the park there in the first place and always leaves it in the same condition I found it in, so what do I know.
Thanks for that Sandro, more people in Seattle should have the courage to say that they’re sick of this uncivil behavior in the park. In Seattle it doesn’t ever seem to be politically correct to stand up for your own rights, for fear that somebody might take offense.
Yes, kids actually are in danger. Not from the sleeping homeless, but definitely the drug dealing and using that goes on in the park. My 5 year old nephew was just stuck by a needle at the Cal Anderson playground. He was walking around the perimeter of the playground and saw the needle at the edge of the bushes. Despite being warned about the dangers of that kind of thing, a kid being a kid, he picked up the needle and got stuck. This has nothing to do with snobbery or discrimination. I just don’t want my nephew or anyone else to live with (or die from) something picked up from some thoughtless idiot who thinks it is ok to use and dispose of needles at a playground.
More homeless tweakers, more gutterpunks, more smack junkies. More aggressive panhandlers from all of the above. More crazies, sometimes armed.
Less of this happened 20 yrs ago, it started going this way 15 yrs ago, and now its pretty bad.
With PC ism rampant, anyone that complains about it gets lumped in with “anti homeless” and such.
Cal Anderson Park is very kid unfriendly. I had a summer theatre camp near there and tried to take the kids to Cal Anderson for lunch. It didn’t feel safe, lots of drug users, dogs off the leash etc.
There is a problem