CORRESPONDENCE - 60B - Laserfiche WebLink

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From: Tim Johnson < Sent: Monday, June 17, 2019 5:07 PM To: eComment; Solorio, Jose; Sarmiento, Vicente; Villegas, Juan; Pulido, Miguel; Iglesias, Cecilia; Penaloza, David Cc: Ridge, Kristine Subject: Parks Security- Agenda Item 60B This email is regarding Agenda Item 60B, where council will be considering adding additional security at various parks in the city until such a time that a reliable parks ranger program can be established. I am supportive of improving the quality of life of our residents and the enjoyable use of our parks and trails. I believe that additional security patrols until such a time that a parks ranger program can be brought back to our city may be effective in those goals but it also must be done in a fiscally responsible manner and with the goals in mind instead of just throwing additional security at a problem. However, I am concerned about this 3rd amendment as presented in the staff report. I believe that the program can be made even better with the desire to improve the quality of life for those who desire to enjoy our parks in safe manner especially for our children. A few of my concerns are as follows: 1. Parks Covered- This program identifies 5 parks to be patrolled plus additional trails. I believe that it is important to allow the security patrols to not only cover the identified parks and trails but also to provide additional services to other parks throughout the city. If there are additional parks that need attention, then we should be including them. This is especially true since a lot of problems we encounter in our city are transitory meaning that when you clean up one area, it may impact another area ... the problems may just move instead of actually being solved. We need to allow the security patrols to respond to the movement of problems and not just stick to an existing routine. We need to allow our city to make changes within the scope of the program. 2. Time of Patrols- The budget proposal with Allied is identified as daytime shift patrols. Having daytime shifts are important but nighttime shifts are also important and should be built into the program from the beginning. Hopefully, this is a distinction without a difference in the budget language. 3. 5 Park Limitation- I feel that having patrols across the city is important and so having identified parks in each of the wards is great. However, by limiting the covered parks to an arbitrary number we may be hindering the patrols of doing the best job that they can be doing. The city has parks that are literally across the street from each other that can easily be joined into one patrol. We should allow the security patrols to have eyes on other parks and not just the identified ones. This is especially true for parks that can be patrolled from the car... essentially drive by type parks or a quick ground patrol due to the small size of some of our parks. 4. Accountability- I believe that the public has the right to see the results of the parks security patrols and feel that statistics should be published on the city's website weekly to show the number of encounters at each park, the types of problems encountered, the results of those encounters. We should also require patrols to report all graffiti or other maintenance issues encountered on patrol and not just suggest it (shall versus must). I am in Ward 3 and am concerned that we are ignoring both Jack Fisher Park and Morrison Park. Both of these parks are easily accessible. Both of these parks can easily be on the way from one of the identified parks to another one (i.e. driving from Santiago Park to Riverview or Edna Parks). I am concerned that if patrol is stepped up in the Santiago Creek area and Santiago Creek, this may impact Jack Fisher Park which I have to assume is not the desired result. I envision other parks having the same issues. As a resident of Ward 3, 1 would encourage you to include Jack Fisher Park and Morrison Park on the patrol schedule for the security guards. Jack Fisher Park has been impacted by various undesirable actions by some and with some additional support, I believe that we can make it a great park once again that can be enjoyed by the families in the area who can easily walk to this park.