Trouble in the Park : Citizens Panel Offers Plan to Curb Balboa Crime, Help Homeless

A Balboa Park citizens committee, fed up with crime in the sprawling urban expanse of hills and canyons, recommended a 26-point plan Friday to the City Council calling for increased police patrols, parking lot security booths, a decrease in late-night auto traffic and brighter outdoor lighting.

In addition, the committee wants local officials to institute a 24-hour, seven-day-a-week court to permit the immediate arraignment of people arrested for misdemeanors and nonviolent felonies.

The full-time court is needed, the committee said, to lessen the court load and allow more serious crimes to be tried. As it is now, many park crimes, such as petty theft and assault, are committed by repeat offenders, whose offenses are given low priority in a crowded court system.

The committee, which was created at the behest of Councilman John Hartley, whose district includes the park, has spent more than a year exploring ways to make the 1,300-acre park safer and divert transients into social service programs.

For the homeless, the proposal--called “Take Back the Park”--outlines plans to rehabilitate two dozen homes owned by the San Diego Housing Commission for use as transitional housing. The proposal also includes plans to establish a nonprofit foundation to fund new social service programs, a park detoxification center and mental health “sanctuaries.”

The proposal, which is scheduled to be discussed by the City Council on Monday, will be refined by the citizens committee if it is endorsed by the council. Each program in the proposal would then require separate council approval before being implemented.

The goal of the plan, organizers said, is not to sweep the homeless and the criminals out of the area and have them relocate nearby, but to help them out of their homeless state.

One element of the proposal is to form “watch patrols” armed with cellular telephones. The patrols would rove park grounds, identifying the needy and offering help.

“The phones will be used for immediate referral,” said Alice R. Stark, an advocate for the homeless at the Uptown Interfaith Service Center.

Hartley said at Friday’s news conference, held against a backdrop of blue skies and the sun-drenched park, that there is a distinction between “legitimate homeless” and “criminals,” both of whom have appeared in discomforting numbers in the park and have frightened neighbors.

“The legitimate homeless need help finding social services,” Hartley said. “Criminals need to be in jail . . . and the citizens should be able come to the park without feeling intimidated.”

After formal statements at the news conference, Stark and Hartley embarked on a hike through a glade next to Cabrillo Bridge and down a hillside, in search of people in need.

In tow were a string of television news cameras and reporters.

The group came across Harry Williams, 38, who has been homeless in San Diego for a year.

“Is there any way we can help you?” Hartley said after introducing himself. “Is there anything you need?”

As cameras rolled, Williams, bare-chested, wearing shorts, surrounded by two pieces of luggage and a trash bag full of recyclable bottles and cans, replied: “A job.”

Stark encouraged Williams to talk to a job-referral counselor at the service center on 6th Avenue across the street from the park. She then handed him a card, and the expedition departed.

Asked his impression of the visitors, Williams said they seemed a talkative bunch.

“They sure had a lot of questions,” he said.

He also said he wondered if Hartley was running for a council seat or was already elected.

“Usually they (politicians) do these kinds of thing for the votes,” Williams said.

Mildly impressed when he heard Hartley was indeed an elected councilman, Williams added: “Well then, instead of hearing all this talk, I’m curious to see what they actually get done. The way I’m looking at things . . . actions speak louder than words.”