I just moved to the neighborhood and am appalled at the behavior I see at this park. The recent quincenera practicing has been adorable but the vast majority of the people I see hanging out there head to the southeast picnic table to smoke drugs where they are even further out of site. I tried to call the non-emergency number this evening because I am fed up with feeling like I can’t use my neighborhood park but the unsavories left the park before I could get through. Should I continue to try to call the police or is there a more effective methodd to take back our park?
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Yes, please continue to report these problems. I do the same as I like to enjoy that park with my dog or running the stairs at the amphitheater. We should be able to enjoy a park without intimidation by drug users.
How do they intimidate you?
The stench of pot, alcohol, piss, and litter are pretty intimidating to a family with young children. As is the glazed over glare of a group of stoned men wearing attire commonly associated with gangs. I realize it is hip to look gangsta, but, if you look like a gangsta, bob around like a gangsta, huddle in the dark with a gang, ye’ll out an alarm call when a cop or white man approach, then, uh, well, that could be intimidating. Have you never seen this behavior? It looks normal to you?
We don’t have to agree. Normal varies according to experience. The fella’s I speak of think they are normal. Nobody else does.
Please call 911, not the non-emergency number. East Precinct dispatches resources based on call volume. Let the operator decide how to deal with the call – if they need to put you on hold they will.
Also, please come to the EastPAC meetings and talk with East Precinct officers – they need to know where the problems are, and that park is not easy to see from the street. The meetings get posted on the calendar here at CDNews; they are usually the 4th Thursday of each month, and generally held on the Seattle U campus. Encourage your neighbors to come.
you are wasting emergency service time with your incredibly petty calling of 911. someone could be dying in a fire, and you are taking resources away from that with your petty, small-minded, pathetic ways
It would be better if police or park rangers checked these things out regularly, rather than people calling 911. The city seems negligent in so many ways. Seattle is not a very good place to be. Violence, run down. How did they let it get so bad?
Not being safe in the park is an emergency. SPD must respond to the crisis in our neighborhood before more innocent people are killed. And we can be sure that it is just a matter of time. The police can be reached at 911. You have legitimate concerns about unlawful behavior and safety.
Other than that, keep using the parks. We are safer in numbers. Take back our parks by filling them with legitimate users. Same with the streets.
You should stay inside your homes and never leave them again. Especially now that those “drugs” are legal and more and more “drug users” will be out in the open, wantonly smoking their “drugs” and looking at you with red eyes.
Dont bother calling the police, I heard they are all stoners anyways…!
I’ve seen people hanging out at the picnic tables a lot, but I haven’t *seen* the drug use. What I have seen is a lot of trash, and drug paraphernalia (dime bags, swisher sweet wrappers).
I did witness what I think was a drug deal beginning when a man walked from the park walked to the end of the cul-de-sac to meet a new, gray VW beatle with white racing stripes, that just pulled up with a female driver. I was riding into my driveway at the time, so I didn’t see what went down. A few minutes later the car drove off. I would consider that suspicious behavior.
The issue is, unless you go right up to the shelter and hang out with the folks there, it’s hard to tell what’s going on. I don’t like to make assumptions about people that are just hanging out, so I haven’t called the cops.
I suspect the people that live right behind the shelter would have a much better view of what’s going on.
I will be happy to help out with any efforts, since I live very close to the park. I would like to attend the EastPAC meeting. The web site looks out of date: “next meeting Dec. 8th, 2011”. I will inquire about their meeting location and dates.
Yes, the EastPAC web site is temporarily not maintained. But the meetings are on the fourth Thursday of each month except November/December (there is a combined meeting early in December each year). Locations vary but are usually at Seattle University. They are always announced a few days ahead in an article in the Central District News and usually on CDN’s calendar. Please join us on July 25!
Yes, please make sure to come to the EastPac meetings and JohnS is correct call 911 and report suspicious activity and be firm that you are seeing something suspicious. The operator will ask you to describe what you see etc. Know that you are not alone. If you know that it is a drug deal for sure then say drug dealing.
are we talking about pot when you say “smoke drugs?” cause you do know that we just legalized that right? and even though you’re not supposed to be smoking it out in the public, the police won’t respond to a couple of dudes smoking a blunt in a park. lowest priority. that and we live in a containment zone blah blah blah…
If it’s just folks hanging out smoking pot, no, I probably wouldn’t call that in, unless they were doing something else at the same time. It’s SPD’s lowest priority, still, post private use legalization.
But something tells me that’s not what was going on here.
And Aubrey, the police would tell you that if you think it’s suspicious, call it in; trust your own judgment that something ‘doesn’t feel right’ because most of the time you are correct. You know your immediate neighborhood better than most, and you know what’s ‘normal’ and what isn’t.
See you at EastPAC.
You dont feel right there because you dont belong there. Why would you move to an area where you find every other person (besides the white hipsters of course) “suspicious” and accuse them of being “drug users” for smoking a blunt?? You should move to a more appropriate neighborhood…
I don’t really have a problem with people smoking pot in public. I have seen evidence of harder drugs in that park in the form of dime bags, which I’m pretty sure is for something other than pot. That does bother me.
I’m concerned with the amount of trash that seems to pile up in that park. I used to go though and pick it up a few times a month, but now I just concentrate on the streets around my house.
How do you know the phrase dime bag, but don’t know that they are for a dime (10$) of pot? In other words, dime bag= small bag of pot.
If it bothers you so much, why don’t you LEAVE
True that bigger. They won’t respond. Thing is, idle youth, blowing their limited resources on excessive pot smoking, offensive disrespectful demeanor, and failure to engage society in a healthy way is a huge part of the problem. I’m not opposed to pot smoking, but, it’s a shame to watch kids smoke their lives away intent on rejecting any hope of success.
true that pine. but calling the cops on said kids isn’t the answer. legalizing pot is perhaps the best thing we’ve done for these “idle youth.” we won’t discuss current prison percentages and incriminating charges of detainees. let’s work on another end of this problem.
Yup.
My home has a very unique position to see what is happening in the park. I really couldn’t care less if kids are down there smoking pot, I certainly smoked my fair share when I was younger. I am indeed making an assumption about what they are smoking as I don’t want to hang out with binoculars; the behavior I witness after they smoke is what leads me to believe it’s not pot or tobacco. Additionally, it’s not young kids but older people who look like they have had a harder time of it than some and I have heard numerous verbal altercations.
Donna – the park is between 21st and 22nd between Yesler and Jackson. It is set back from all of these streets making it invisible from the streets unless you go down Washington to the end. 22nd curves around it, but the street is elevated above the park at that point. The set up is perfect for keeping your behavior relatively private.
I will be there on the 25th :)
It used to be a swamp that ran down through Judkins area and into the valley. I often think it would be nice to clear that whole area and build a new swamp. All those people there are just unlawful takers of the native lands and destroyers of the environment. Plus only 13.6% contribute to society in any meaningful way.
Actually, the percentage is 14.3.
Drug deals gone bad often are a source of violence. Too many different drugs, combined with emotion and poor judgement often lead to violence. Often places get trashed and become unpleasant and then aren’t frequented by many residents. All of these elements affect public safety. I don’t know if I want to debate the pot smoking business here, but it is illegal to drink or smoke pot in the park or sell the items in the park. Likely, there are other drugs involved too. This mostly about taking action before the park becomes undesirable, fights break out, or bullets start flying. It is better all the way around for all to take preventative action. Yes, services for addicts, adults, and youth are a piece of it, but keeping the park safe for all, rich and poor, is also important.
Drug deals in my experience usually result in rainbows and butterflies :) :) :) :) :) :) :)
Have they physically hurt you, or you just don’t like they way they look? They have a right to use the park regardless of what they look like.
And dime bags and Swisher Sweets mean blunts, which is legal. Littering is not.
Did you look into Wallingford or Laurelhurst before you moved here?
You may have valid points NIMBY fighter. These debates are never won. It is a process of moving and validating the middle ground of social acceptability.
Idle minded pot smokers won a large battle to continue their downhill slide to oblivion in the privacy of their own homes. Pot will end up regulated just like Alcohol. Quantitative analyse and Qualitative behavioral tests will be rolled out and refined by the courts. Public intoxication will be regulated. Health effects will be verified.
Second hand smoke will be regulated. Fines for pot smoking in public, pot smoking and driving, will help drive up punative revenue collected by municipalities. Perhaps we can push for photo enforced smoking tickets in our parks. Damn – I’m a genious. Of course we will need photo reckognition software. This is what all the HSA funded cameras are a prelude to. Tracking and extracting punative revenue. Good $7;! man.
Are you seriously suggesting that people have to be physically harmed before one is allowed to pose a question about suspicious activity? Wow.
Everybody has a right to use the park. When some residents are uncomfortable using the park there is a problem. The park either has the group of people I mentioned or it has other people. The groups don’t mix.
Regarding the neighborhood comment, I certainly don’t have a problem with gritty places. I spent the last decade living in Tacoma, the final few years in Hilltop while working downtown; both are diverse neighborhoods and I have seen more than my fair share of people strung out on all types of drugs. I do have a problem with people smoking something in a pipe that takes a lot more heat than pot does that is quickly exhaled in a thick cloud. Perhaps the pot is so much different here in Seattle? I also have a problem with one particular gentleman who is there every evening who seems to have a lot of friends who only want to chat with him for a couple of minutes.
Welcome Trishl. There are few nationalist socialists here who play along as if they are liberal do gooders or anarchists or environmental justice seekers. They try to discredit everybody else as racist or ignorent. They are very misguided about their own beliefs and intents and have no frame of reference for basic concerns of raising a family. Every single conversation is turned into a platform to stir up racial or class discord. These efforts are always led by the nationalist socialists like 98122 and Omari. Others try to moderate or offer balancing perspectives, but, the 122s are so far off center that they make kids playing on a swingset look like Pat Buchanan.
Yes, you clearly do know what illegal drug activity looks like. You also clearly understand what a safety risk looks like. Please continue your engagement to clean up the park. The same things are happening at Judkins, Pratt, Seward and many more parks, bus stops, and curbs. We need several people on every block to take a stand and demand justice for families and all decent hopefull members of our community. Safe enjoyable parks, Safe maintained streets and bikeways, Safe schools where funding is directed at classroom education, Enforcement of criminal law and removal of dangerous felons from society. Now that would be justice. So strange that 98122 can argue against any of this as if inviting criminals is good for the poor or black people. We understand adversity and racism. But how maintaining a criminal class helps rectify those things is beyond my comprehension.
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pinebeetle, who uses several names, says
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led by the nationalist socialists
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He or she needs to get up to speed on politics.
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I am not by any means an expert on these things but even novices know that socialists are by definition internationalists. Also not all people who think of themselves as nationalists agree with each other. Same for people who think of themselves as socialists. So when using these words, pinebeetle says nothing unless she or he defines the terms.
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And, yes, I do believe that any economic system that does not meet the basic material needs of its children, including fully funded public schools, and the basic material needs of its old people is not good enough.
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And, yes, I do believe that any economic system that does not come up with enough living wage jobs for all of its working age people is not good enough. Talking about full employment here.
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And, yes, I do believe there is a direct relationship between street robberies and vandalism and and other destructive and self destructive behavior and lack of living wage jobs.
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It is no surprise that some do resort to destructive and self destructive behavior when they find themselves in dire circumstances.
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The remarkable thing is that the overwhelming majority of people keep trying to make their own lives and the lives of others better no matter what obstacles are in their way.
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So, pinebeetle, by various names, does not agree with what I believe. I find his or her responses to be little more than, actually nothing more than, macho talk and cliches and stereotypes of many sorts.
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Mmaaaak!
WTF!? Really!? We should debate this one AT THE PARK, IN FRONT OF THE VERY PEOPLE YOU HATE! :D
Can you PROVE that ANY of these folks are “national socialists”? Can you even DEFINE what a “national socialist” actually is?
I can. And you have no basis in FACT. You are comparing a life-long resident to Adolf Hitler, his party, and its later off-shoots? Really?
As Mao said, “no investigation, no right to speak!”
Omari is BLACK. Part of a HISTORICALLY and CURRENTLY oppressed NATION of people (what part of the this latest outrage have you missed?). And he has been in the community for over 60 years, you settler-colonial, first-world economic parasite! His family’s arrival here predates Rev. McKinney’s (Mt Zion Baptist Church) arrival here!
You, and others like you, show up within the last 10 years, you wanna shot call, and don’t even know where you live or who is around you, and now you give poor info to a newbie.
Again, and especially for you and others like you, “no investigation, no right to speak.”
Indeed, ANYONE who came to amerikkka even pre-“War of Independence”, who is not Indigenous or whose ancestors did not arrive as cargo, is a gentrifyer This is a HISTORICAL, MATERIAL FACT, that can be proven.
Really, if we look at how the capitalist system actually works, those who support it, as clearly you, are in MATERIAL FACT “national socialists”! Any support of Obama, especially in light of the NSA spying revelations, drone warfare, or his message to Black people to accept the jury verdict in the George Zimmerman trial is complicity in activities domestically and around the world that Hitler himself would envy.
This is the hatred and duplicity of the typical amerikkkan liberal (or what I call a “libturd”: One who talks all that ‘good progressive s–t’, but is still just as much a fascist as his republikkkon counterpart). In this case, the invader wants to tell the “savages” how to live. And, of course, this dove-tails with all things wrong with amerikkkans generally: racist, sexist, homophobic, provincial, imperialist, cynical, opportunistic, low-info, lazy, often on some form of prescription drug with terrible mental or emotional side effects, and more.
In short, “WAKE UP, GOD DAMMIT!”
http://www.allpowertothepositive.info
I think most of us know what national socialists are. But this discussion is about nationalist (not national) socialists, and I never heard of those before.
Trishl, move.