Kinnear Park has recently turned into an open-air drug den, according to police reports and people who live near the Queen Anne greenbelt.
One woman who didn't want her name used said she'd seen an increase in the number of people getting off the bus in the 500 block of West Mercer St. and heading to the park.
"They're younger than the homeless population we usually have." Still, the woman initially wondered if the large crowds were going to the shelter run by the CityTeam Ministry on Elliott Avenue West near West Mercer Place, she said.
That's not the case, according to CityTeam resident and staff member Brian Moody. "Our facility hasn't been seeing any increase in use," he said. But he's seen an increase in use by a new crowd in the park. "There's been an explosion of activity up there."
Moody has heard from police that people are showing up in Kinnear Park to score drugs, he said. "And they're buying a lot." He's also seen a bunch of what he terms "cracked-up" people buying drugs and hanging out in the parking lot near the shelter, Moody added. "I used to walk through the park all the time. I never go up there anymore," he said, adding, "I almost got jumped last week."
The illegal activities have been going on for a couple of months, but it's gotten especially bad just lately, said Lydia Stout, who also lives near Kinnear Park. "But it was like an anthill yesterday," she said in a phone interview on Friday, Oct. 3.
"When they saw me coming, they threw their drugs down and ran." That doesn't always happen. Two of the drug users came up to her in a threatening manner recently, Stout said. "One of them growled at me."
Stout has called police half a dozen times recently about people smoking crack in the greenbelt at all times of the day and night and was told word on the street downtown is there is "a lot of stuff going on in Kinnear Park," she said.
A Queen Anne resident for 14 years, Stout said she's never been afraid to walk in the park before, and that included before the city cleaned out the homeless encampments earlier this year. "The homeless, I considered them to be my neighbors," she said. "We looked out for each other."
Another measure of the problem, Stout said, is her small, overprotective dog's reaction to the new crowd in the park. "He growls at these new guys all the time, but he never growled at the homeless guys," she said.
Stout said she's also contacted the mayor's office about what's going on, and she and her neighbors are planning to start a letter-writing campaign to Mayor Greg Nickels to get something done about it.
The Queen Anne woman who didn't want her name used said she saw police in a patrol car in the park chasing two running men last Friday and using a loud speaker to tell them to stop. She's not sure what happened after that.
But police have taken note of the problem, according to three Sept. 26 police reports that each mention drug activity and prostitution taking place in the park. One that was filed at 3 a.m. that Friday indicates an officer came upon a van parked in the lot near the CityTeam building.
Lots of people were approaching the van and leaving, but the van was driven off before the officer got to it, leaving one man behind, according to the report. That man walked briskly away after the officer told him to stop, and he hid in some bushes briefly before reappearing.
"(The man) smelt of alcohol and was sweating profusely with an increased heart rate," the report states. He also allegedly admitted drinking earlier that day and smoking crack three days earlier. The police report notes the man is on probation for drug violations, and he was arrested for failing to follow the terms of his release.
Staff reporter Russ Zabel can be reached at rzabel@nwlink.com or 461-1309.
[[In-content Ad]]
