Taft Park curfew tops Humboldt council meeting

By PHIL MONSON
On Oct. 1, Humboldt Mayor Walter Jensen read a proclamation stating no one under the age of 16 not accompanied by a parent or legal guardian is not allowed at Taft Park.

The emergency curfew is in place until Nov. 1. Any questions regarding the declaration should be directed to the Humboldt Police Department. The proclamation took place at a press conference held in front of city hall.

“We are asking the community to help us with Taft Park. There have been some incidents there in the last couple of weeks that are being handled through the normal legal process where we have apprehended or are investigating,” Humboldt Police Chief Jacob Miller at the press conference.

“We are asking for parents in the community to keep an eye on that particular park and see if they can help us stem any incidences that may occur,” Miller said.

Taft Park was the main topic of discussion at the council meeting held on Monday night, Oct. 5.

“We have had mixed feedback from the public, but mostly positive,” Humboldt City Administrator Amy Zeman said.

“The mayor and councilmen have gotten feedback that it was the right thing to do, being aware of ongoing issues at the park,” Zeman said. “The police chief said there were no incidents over the weekend.”

“There have been six assaults at the park,” Jensen said. “It has been mostly afternoon hours right after school.”

“It is mostly Wednesday afternoons when school is off one hour early when kids hang out at the park before they go home,” Zeman said. “It is mostly throughout the playground and by the shelter house.”

“It’s a small group of kids. Not one or two people in particular,” Zeman said. “It doesn’t sound like they are picking on anyone in particular, just anyone in random.”

“We allotted an additional four hours of overtime for every weekend for the police department over the next four weekends to increase the patrol at all of the parks and concentrated at Taft,” Zeman said.

“Some comments on Facebook said ‘they’ll just go to a different park.’ Our stance is that we will start with this and take that middle ground so we aren’t cutting off all the parks, but we want to back what we are saying and that we are taking action on it,” Zeman said.

“This will be on the council agenda at our Oct. 19 meeting in case we need to make a change,” Jensen said.

“And this will give anybody from the public who has questions to be able to attend a meeting and provide input,” Zeman said.

Councilman Joel Goodell asked if the school has security cameras at Taft Park.

“They do and we have access to those cameras. The city also has cameras located in certain areas. Our 28E agreement with the school is such that it is our responsibility outside of school hours,” Zeman said. “They are available when we need them.”

Jensen said the six assaults involved all minors.

Councilman John Sleiter asked if the minors can be charged. Zeman said they are referred to the juvenile court system.

“According to Jake (chief), the juvenile gets a letter in the mail the first time they do something. The second time, they might get a visit from the police department. It is at least the third time or more before you can do anything in terms of charging the child or taking them to court,” Jensen said.

Of course, parents will say their kid didn’t do anything or ‘he isn’t that bad.’

“The police can’t go into the park and do anything without the proclamation. It gives police the power to disperse the kids or do something that they couldn’t do before,” Jensen said.

“When something happens after the curfew time, then police can take action,” Zeman said.

“We picked Nov. 1 to get us through Halloween. As we get more feedback from the police department and the public, we’ll know more about what to do going forward at our next meeting,” Zeman said.

“Jake hopes with the cooler weather the kids might not be gathering so much,” Jensen said.

“Taft is the transfer station for when kids from the middle school and high school get off the bus. You have more of an audience there. We have more of a temporary plan on how kids react,” Zeman said.

“If the next council meeting comes along and those things return or they are moving to another park, it gives us an opportunity to get a different ordinance in place,” Zeman said.

“The entire police department will give us feedback on what seems to be working and what doesn’t,” Zeman said.

Ordinances

Councilman Kirk Whittlesey brought up concerns about persons riding electric scooters and bicycles on downtown Sumner Avenue, violating the new ordinance put in place last year. Whittlesey said he saw persons riding on downtown sidewalks on his way to the meeting.

“One of our police officers saw somebody on a scooter in violation and they stopped them and talked to them. I also saw a state trooper stop a kid on a bike. The problem with any ordinance is you must catch people doing it,” Sleiter said.

“The manufacturers keep making different modifications to get around the different laws being created to deal with them,” Zeman said. “It’s like everything else. Laws are the laws and rules are the rules but people are going to disobey the law anyway. We can’t control the lack of parenting going on out there.”

“On certain streets you are now allowed to operate an ATV or golf cart and adults are doing it. So how can you expect a 10 or 13-year-old kid to follow it when some of the grownups are doing it?” Goodell asked.

“Like everything else, we can control so much. You put up cameras to protect yourselves and then somebody comes along and shoots the cameras,” Goodell said.

Zeman said the city is developing a four-tier system to enforce ordinance violations.

“The first tier will be the doorknockers. The green tags that will address the violation, like mowing and garbage. The second tier will address parking violations or snow enforcement. The third will be animal at-large violations. The fourth option will be campers not parked on a hard-surface or cars parked over a sidewalk. We will begin implementing that this week,” Zeman said.

“At 4 p.m. the officer will go out and place the tags where they need to be placed. There will be a 48-hour period where we will check back on the things that we can hold. At 48 hours a letter most likely will go out from the attorney. If nothing is done, we will look at municipal infractions,” Zeman said.

“The city employees are going to be the ones reporting the infractions. They will only report the violation and the address of the location,” Jensen said.

“If you guys see something, let us know and we will track it down and go from there,” Zeman said. “The police department is all on board with this.”