Photo by David Cruz
In the last few weeks, Williamsbridge Oval Park has experienced a wave of unsettling incidents that include spurts of unsolved fires, ghastly graffiti tags, and daytime fistfights (with at least one reported stabbing of a 17-year-old) among young people.
The Oval, as it’s known, is the epicenter of working-class Norwood. It’s the community’s main family-friendly venue ever since it was repurposed from a defunct city reservoir in the 1930s. Activity at the park typically decreases around this time, but warmer temperatures have put that on hold. Incidents, it seems, have ticked up. The latest happened during the last week of November, when at least three nighttime fires were reported. The same week, a graffiti tag reading, “Los Profetas,” the fictional name of a street gang featured in the six-year TV series The Shield, was found on pillars to the west.
The 52nd Precinct, an overly busy stationhouse, has acknowledged the problem. To their credit it has devoted more officers to the Oval, conducting nightly patrols. The New York City Parks Department has also reacted, dispatching at least two Park Enforcement Patrol (PEP) officers to monitor the park’s safety.
But questions surface: What happens when the authorities leave? Would that make the park vulnerable and unchecked once again?
Instead of a reactive approach, common by city agencies, a permanent solution to improving security at Oval Park is warranted. That can come in raising the number of PEP officers, unarmed security personnel whose reach extends to just enforcing park rules. With just a pittance of PEP officers rotating patrols at the Bronx’s 291 parks, their presence comes unnoticed. Riding in patrol vehicles, PEP officers are deemed peacekeepers, monitoring any happenings. But they cannot carry firearms, making their job more of a hall monitor post than an actual authority.
A baseline Parks Department budget keeps the PEP numbers the same, but with more park goers than ever before, more staffing is inevitable. In Norwood, where construction of various residences along Webster Avenue will eventually usher an increased neighborhood population, more PEP officers are a necessity. At some parks, private partnerships foot the bill in hiring more security staff. At parks with no private endowments, they’re at the mercy of the NYPD or any available PEP unit.
Even if the number of PEP officers increases, their authority is limited. Without arresting power, PEP officers can only rely on responding NYPD officers, a taxing recourse. In one recent incident at the Oval, a pair of PEP officers spotted young people roughhousing from their patrol car. They didn’t exit their vehicle, opting to remain inside instead. Waste of resources.
Other proposals since the recent park issues include adequate lighting, a resource that could rankle residents, yet could serve as its best deterrent. A controversial request for surveillance cameras was also proposed, though children should not be videotaped when enjoying a park.
Perhaps the best vigilance comes from neighbors encircling the park. Keeping a watchful eye on this heavily used amenity can help save some lives at the park. Preserving the peace is an obligation in protecting a valuable park.
Maybe it’s a good thing these issues at the Oval are happening now. Fewer people are out there in cold weather. Let’s hope these issues are resolved before next summer.
admin
Welcome to the Norwood News, a bi-weekly community newspaper that primarily serves the northwest Bronx communities of Norwood, Bedford Park, Fordham and University Heights. Through our Breaking Bronx blog, we focus on news and information for those neighborhoods, but aim to cover as much Bronx-related news as possible. Founded in 1988 by Mosholu Preservation Corporation, a not-for-profit affiliate of Montefiore Medical Center, the Norwood News began as a monthly and grew to a bi-weekly in 1994. In September 2003 the paper expanded to cover University Heights and now covers all the neighborhoods of Community District 7. The Norwood News exists to foster communication among citizens and organizations and to be a tool for neighborhood development efforts. The Norwood News runs the Bronx Youth Journalism Heard, a journalism training program for Bronx high school students. As you navigate this website, please let us know if you discover any glitches or if you have any suggestions. We’d love to hear from you. You can send e-mails to norwoodnews@norwoodnews.org or call us anytime (718) 324-4998.
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PEP Officers do have the authority to make arrests – see http://www.nycgovparks.org/about/urban-park-service/park-enforcement-patrol
Why did the author of this article no bother to check the statutory authority of the PEP officers before writing this article? Now as to WHY, the PEP officers remained within their patrol car isn’t clear from this article. Indeed, the author claims at one point they were “rough-housing’…..which isn’t a violation of the law, per se and yet the lines posted below the picture state that the same boys were engaged in fighting. What was it ?
While both could be “disorderly conduct” neither always result in a statutory arrest situation.
Indeed there should be many more PEP officers patrolling the city parks and here in Norwood that would make a difference.
As the author states that Norwood is ‘working class”, many other such neighborhoods have men and women who become NYPD Auxiliary police officers. They too would be a valuable tool in these quality of life crimes. Perhaps the author could pursue another possible reason for the rise of vandalism etc at the park. That would be that NYPD officers have been hog-tied by the Department, the NYC Council, the media and others in the very good and necessary tool of ‘stop and frisk”. Think there is a relationship…you bet.
Pax
Bob Rainis…..no longer in Norwood, but lovin’ the area and people who live and work there.