County closes skate park

Friday, Jan. 24, 2003 | 11:12 a.m.

Clark County officials shut down one of their skate parks Thursday, a day after the city of Las Vegas declined to take similar action despite reports of vandalism, violence and graffiti at theirs.

But young skateboarders moved quickly to clean up the facility they use so it could reopen.

About two dozen members of the Evolve and Cambridge skate clubs were allowed to pass through entrances sealed off by strands of bright yellow police tape Thursday afternoon at the Winchester Community Center Skate Park to paint over the graffiti at the facility, one of six in the county.

The park is located where McLeod Drive meets Pecos Road, just north of Desert Inn Road.

Although they were not the ones who had spray-painted gang symbols and initials on the concrete fixtures at the park, the teenagers eagerly spread coats of county-issued phantom gray and schoolhouse red paint so that their facility could reopen in time for club qualifying trials scheduled for this evening.

"We see taggers (graffiti writers) do it right in front of us, and we tell them to take it somewhere else, but they don't listen," said 18-year-old Edward Jeffries of the Cambridge team, noting that the troublemakers' response usually is an obscene gesture or word.

"When I started skateboarding four years ago in Los Angeles, they had security at the parks. I guess they can't afford that here. But security 24/7 is the only way you're going to stop taggers."

Ashley Sewall, 16, president of the Evolve Skate Club, said the graffiti popped up a little at a time. But it has gotten to so bad, she says, that she understands why the county had to close the park Thursday to clean it up.

"It's not the skaters, but some of the people who like to hang out at the skate parks who are causing trouble," Sewall said. "If I see them doing it, I tell them to get out of here and I report it to the police. I'm not afraid of them. I believe we can police ourselves."

Ted Donko, a 13-year-old skateboarder, said sometimes kids do not know what to do.

"If we tell our parents that we see taggers or people causing trouble, they say we can't go to the skate park because they don't want us to get hurt or get into trouble," he said. "We want them to help us, not punish us for reporting problems."

Asked if he thought the closure or recent news media attention to the problem would deter vandals, Donko said: "I don't think so because they don't care who they hurt."

Russell Davis, a member of the Skate Park Safety Coalition and coordinator of the Evolve Skate Club, said the kids' effort to clean up the mess shows their dedication to their sport and to their community.

"They do not like to see this because this is their park -- they are taking ownership and they are taking responsibility," Davis said, noting the the kids expected to see the park reopen today. "We don't want skate parks closed even for one day. But we have to draw a line."

Winchester Skate Park also has been victimized by signs being torn down, specifically the posted safety rules, and lighting fixtures being destroyed.

"This can be considered a warning shot," said Doug Bradford, manager for resource development for the Clark County Parks and Recreation Department. "The message is that we need to work together and that people need to be respectful of property or we are going to have to temporarily close places to repair them."

Bradford said, however, that in some ways, skate park problems are declining. For example, at Desert Breeze Park at Spring Mountain Road and Durango Drive, incidents are down.

"We had just one fight reported last month at Desert Breeze," Bradford said, noting it has a park police officer specifically assigned there. Other parks, however, have to rely on patrols, he said.

On Wednesday the Las Vegas City Council said it did not want to punish the many law-abiding young skateboarders because of the criminal activities of a few bad apples.