A dawn-to-dusk curfew, more lighting and increased police patrols at troubled Lanyon Park has helped ease the fears of residents who have complained the park has been overrun by the homeless.
“What we heard from residents is that a dawn-to-dusk concept was pretty impactful,” City Manager Harold Dominguez told the city council Tuesday night.
He also said a communication system dedicated to informing the city about issues at the park has also helped, as well as more outreach work to help the park’s homeless find more permanent shelter.
Some homeless, however, don’t want to find more stable situations, city officials said. “There is a group of folks who do not want to be housed,” Public Safety Director Zach Ardis told the council. “The question is “How do we co-exist?”
The city council spent about an hour discussing issues surrounding Lanyon Park. The council generally approved of the comprehensive approach the city continues to take in dealing with problems at the park.
But council members conceded homelessness remains a complicated issue that dogs the entire city.
“Homelessness is not going away,” said Mayor Joan Peck.
Dominguez told the council that a Neighborhood Impact Team was formed after residents complained last year about the homeless spending their days and evenings at Lanyon Park, often doing drugs and disrupting family-type activities .
Some of the concerns reported by residents, according to a city staff report, included:
- Taking over park shelters and not letting others use them
- Using illegal substances and engaging in other “inappropriate activities” in and around the park
- Vandalizing the park’s restrooms, shelters and other amenities.
- Getting into arguments with each other and with other park users and neighborhood residents.
- Setting up campsites in parks and other public/private properties.
- The unhoused or not stably housed not seeking care and support for behavioral and/or physical health issues.
The Neighborhood Impact Team worked collectively across the city organization and with other community partners to address the issues in Lanyon Park, the staff report states.
The impact team has focused on strategies that:
- Ensure alcohol and drug use and littering in identified neighborhood parks is addressed and diminished.
- Ensure park shelters are available for all users
- Increase resident activity and recreational use in the park.
- Work with community partners to connect people experiencing hoimelessness to services that lead to stable housing
- Ensure a sustainable balance of “compassionate intervention services” and compliance efforts to support welcoming and safe public spaces
- Ensure neighbors, businesses, partners and those experiencing homelessness in Longmont are engaged, and aware of resources and compliance efforts.
Dominguez said those efforts will continue at Lanyon and may be used to deal with problems at other parks. The council agreed that a dawn-to-dusk curfew could be implemented in parks throughout the city.
