ANAHEIM : Vagrants Find Park an Inhospitable Place

When he was growing up in the 1960s, Police Officer Harald Martin spent many hours in La Palma Park, playing ball and roughhousing with his friends.

Thirty years later, Martin is still spending a lot of time in the park, but he’s not having much fun.

Martin, during his off-duty hours, is leading a civilian crusade to remove drug dealers, junkies and homeless alcoholics that he says have taken over the 21-acre park north of downtown and made it inhospitable for families.

Called Somebody, the month-old crusade--which hopes to eventually tackle crime citywide--has 40 participants and has staged two weekend demonstrations in the park. Last Sunday, the group went to the grassy area where the drug dealers normally congregate, asked them to leave and then dumped 1,750 pounds of steer manure on the spot to make it offensive for anyone to stand there.

The group takes its name from the common lament: “The police can’t solve all of our problems, but somebody’s got to do something.”

“When I was a kid, there never was a problem in the park, not even once,” Martin, 38, said. “Today, you don’t see many kids here. Rarely do you see a family here. We want to make this park safe for the kids again.”

The Police Department has no statistics immediately available detailing the crime problem in the park, but Lt. Vince Howard said it has a reputation of being one of the three or four toughest areas in the city.

“You have prostitution that is occurring there, drug dealing and some aggravated assaults from drug deals that have gone bad,” Howard said. “There are one or two areas that are worse, but it is one of the worst.”

Martin, a 12-year veteran of the police force whose patrol area includes the park, said officers cannot be in the park 24 hours a day, so it is up to nearby residents and business owners to put the pressure on the drug dealers to drive them out of the park.

“We have been conditioned by television and the movies to believe that every drug dealer is armed with 12 submachine guns and will shoot up anybody who gets in his way,” Martin said. “But most of these guys are businessmen. They don’t want confrontation. They want a location where they are comfortable and their customers are comfortable. If their customers start telling them, ‘I don’t like coming here because there are too many people watching,’ the dealers will move.”

Business owners near the park said they support Somebody. They said they are losing customers because drug dealers and panhandlers approach almost everyone who comes into the area.

“I have had a lot of women customers tell me they won’t come to my store anymore because they are afraid,” said Paul Burke, the manager of a scuba diving supply store across the street from the park. “Just yesterday, I had a bum threaten me because I told him not to urinate on my wall anymore.”

Martin said an Orange County welfare office across the street from the park is at the core of its problems, many of which could be solved if the office were moved. A check-cashing store is next to the welfare office, and two liquor stores are within 100 yards. He said Somebody wants to schedule a meeting with county officials to discuss the future of the office.

However, Larry Leaman, the county’s director of social services, said the welfare office is not to blame for the park’s problems.

“Is the problem the responsibility of the users and buyers of the drugs, the city because it has a park or the county because it gives welfare assistance to those who are eligible?” Leaman asked. “I would argue it is the users. . . . I have never seen any statistics, and I doubt that (Martin) has either, that would show that a higher percentage of welfare recipients use drugs than people who work.”