What’s Up with That? Zero tolerance? No. But parks do close at night

I live downtown and walk my dog in Esther Short Park — sometimes at night. I follow the rules and scoop the poop. One night, I was there about 10 minutes past 10 p.m. when I saw somebody looking for something in the grass. I went over to help and it turned out to be a police officer — who told me the park was closed and I needed to leave. I told him other officers had seen me in the park with my dog even later than that and never had a problem. This officer said enforcing the rule was discretionary. But eventually — after I pressed it a bit — he said if he catches me again I’d get a ticket and my dog would be impounded. I think he was enforcing the letter of the law but not the spirit, which is to keep the park safe. If I can’t walk my dog in the park at night, I have to find somewhere else to go and that’s less safe. Have they instituted a zero-tolerance policy about being in the park after hours?

—Ken Campbell, Esther Short neighborhood

In Vancouver, open hours for parks are 5 a.m. to 10 p.m. In unincorporated Clark County, it’s 7 a.m. to dusk. In this reporter’s experience, those hours are all extremely well-posted and hard to miss. If there’s an exception, that’s well-posted, too.

“Esther Short Park has the same rules as other parks in the City of Vancouver. This includes a park curfew time of 10 p.m. People in the park can be cited, criminally, for being in the park after hours,” wrote Vancouver Police Cpl. Drue Russell.

But it doesn’t sound like that actually happens too often. Russell wrote that the “spirit of the law is to curb criminal activity in the park during hours of darkness. It is not the intent of the Vancouver Police Department to cite or arrest everyone in the park during these times. Officers can use discretion enforcing the ordinance, especially with individuals who are suspected of illicit activity.

“This would not include people walking their dogs, patrons of the hotel or local businesses, or people using the park as a ‘short cut.’ Letting these people know that the park is closed is oftentimes enough.”

In other words, Ken, there doesn’t appear to be any zero-tolerance policy.

Russell also said people convicted of crimes in the park — including littering and “unlawful camping” as well as breaking curfew — can be barred from the park for 90 days by a judge as part of their sentence. When such an exclusion occurs, police are notified by the Vancouver city attorney, and a flier is distributed to local businesses by the Esther Short Neighborhood Association.

Russell said police are working with the neighborhood association, volunteers for the police assistance program Neighbors on Watch, the parks and recreation department and local business Bad Monkey, a bike-and-skateboard shop, to keep the park patrolled, well lit and safe.