Skateboarders on a Roll as Several Cities Plan Parks

Former Mayor Sharon Cody knew it wasn’t legal for the young man to be wheeling around the elementary school on his skateboard, so she dropped a dime on him.

Shortly after police cited the teenager, Cody got a call from his mother. She found out that the skateboarder was the brother of her son’s best friend.

“She wasn’t angry or anything,” Cody said of the incident earlier this year. “She talked to me for a long time and opened my eyes to the fact that a majority of these skateboarders aren’t menacing little old ladies at supermarkets. They’re mostly real nice, normal kids.”

Across Orange County, attitudes toward skateboarding are changing. Though still banned in many communities, it is being recognized by residents and officials as a legitimate recreation, and several cities are moving forward with plans to build skateboard parks.

Laguna Hills and Laguna Beach have committed themselves to joining Huntington Beach, which since 1993 has had the only skateboard parks in the county.

Officials in San Clemente and Laguna Niguel support the concept but are still looking for suitable locations and financing. Santa Ana and Irvine are researching the issue.

“Personally, I think there is an obligation” to build skateboard parks in cities that ban the sport in public places, said Tim Casey, Laguna Niguel city manager. “You have to deal with the reality that there are places where it’s inappropriate, but on the other hand, skateboarding is very popular.”

In many communities, officials are beginning to realize the popularity of skateboarding as youngsters and their parents show up by the dozens at city council meetings to lobby for skateboard parks.

When Chris Meadows’ son was ticketed by Mission Viejo police for skateboarding at a school, “it was a huge wake-up call for me,” she said. “Granted, we don’t want them in parking lots. . . . But it’s unfair to keep them from skateboarding when cities do not provide them anyplace else to go.”

Meadows recruited Cody to help the cause and to organize two dozen other parents and their children to attend a Mission Viejo City Council meeting.

“We’re talking about good kids,” Meadows said. “As a parent, I don’t want my child given a choice of basically not doing something he loves and doing something illegal.”

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For officials, the main obstacle to building public skateboard parks is liability. They envision a teen trying a daring, acrobatic spin, falling off the board and breaking an arm. The fear is that the parents will then sue the city.

For that reason, they have watched closely the situation in Huntington Beach and a handful of other cities, among them Temecula and Escondido, that have been running municipal skateboard parks for several years.

In Huntington Beach, the results have been excellent: no severe accidents or claims filed against the city in four years, said Bill Fowler, city superintendent of recreation.

“It’s a pretty good record that speaks for itself,” said Fowler, who was involved in building two skateboard parks. “We as cities continue to build softball diamonds and basketball courts and not blink an eye. Yet these sports cause us a lot more trouble in terms of liability than skateboard parks.”

The success of Huntington Beach’s skateboard parks helped to break down resistance to such facilities, leading other cities to consider them.

Others remain unconvinced.

“You can’t risk the city treasury on the last couple of years” that Huntington Beach has gone without a claim, said William S. Craycraft, mayor of Mission Viejo. “Just because a person goes a few years without a traffic accident, does that mean he won’t be unlucky tomorrow?”

In addition to liability concerns, finding the right place to put a skateboard park is an obstacle.

“NIMBY-ism”--not in my backyard--is a problem, Fowler said. “Where do you find a spot in town where somebody isn’t going to go crazy over a skateboard park? Any more than two people complaining, and a site is going to have trouble” winning council approval.

Financing is often the final hurdle. In San Clemente, for example, officials say they want to build a skateboard park and have found a couple of suitable locations, but they are facing a serious budget crunch and just don’t have the $150,000 they need to build a basic facility.

The solution there could be a partnership between the community and city. A group of local skateboarders and their parents are gearing up to raise the money for the park.

“Providing recreation services and park facilities is a balancing act,” said Bruce Wegner, San Clemente’s parks and recreation director. “The city can’t always provide for every need. What we’re saying as a city is, ‘Hey, we’ll meet you halfway.’ ”