A FORUM FOR COMMUNITY ISSUES : Making a Difference : One Neighborhood’s Approach: A Decade’s Work Saves a Park : A Mid-Wilshire Community Overcomes the Odds and Cleans Up a Crime Magnet

STRATEGY

* Know who your City Council representative and Recreation and Park commissioners are.

* Get to know your area’s police captain or police community-relations officer, and the city’s Recreation and Park regional director: Cultivate them as allies and learn their jurisdictional boundaries.

* Present a unified neighborhood front; build a consensus and demonstrate willingness to balance security with the need for open park access.

* Be patient and be prepared to share in problem solving over the long haul.

TACTICS

* Form a neighborhood group or join your area’s neighborhood group and meet regularly.

* Keep a log of undesirable or criminal activities in your park.

* Obtain supporting crime statistics as needed from area’s police community-relations officer.

* Invite officials to walk through the park site with community residents and to attend a homeowners’ meeting and discuss the issues.

* Meet with officials at their offices.

* Write letters, make calls, send faxes and petitions that focus on specific concerns and offer ideas for solutions. Avoid unspecific griping.

Reaction: “I think the park looks beautiful. It’s an asset for the neighborhood. I love what’s happening now, but it wouldn’t have happened without persistence.” --Homeowner Barbara McRae

1980: Fed up with growing noise, litter, drug and prostitution activity in and around the small park next to her home, Barbara McRae writes letters to the commissioners of the Department of Recreation and Parks, Councilman John Ferraro and Mayor Tom Bradley, proposing that a private security service patrol the park.

1981: McRae presents petition to city officials signed by 2,248 residents in the neighborhood, supporting the idea of private security patrols.

1982: City officials oppose private patrols at a public park and respond by building a 12-foot masonry wall and raising a chain-link fence between the park and abutting homes.

1986: The wall makes some difference, but, except for increased police efforts to eliminate drug activity and the addition of a children’s play area that encourages park usage by families, the character of Robert L. Burns Park remains troublesome.

1989: With criminal activity spreading from the park through the neighborhood, the Windsor Square Property Owners Assn. and local residents ask that the park be closed at sunset and request that it be fenced, gated and locked at night.

Dec. 3, 1990: Final inspection and acceptance of $85,000 tubular steel perimeter fence.

1991-Present: The problems at Burns Park diminish and family use increases.