President of the Columbus Park Advisory Council Bernard Clay said community members are concerned that the onset of summer will spark similar security issues that have plagued Columbus Park in the past.
For Clay, the park’s security issues stem from inadequate and unavailable park staffing.
“We don’t want this to come off like it’s a dangerous park,” Clay said. “But if the park would provide security during the open hours it would alleviate a lot of the problems.”
Located at 500 S. Central Ave., Columbus Park’s nearly 141 acres serves Austin and its neighboring communities. Clay said that safety-related incidents at the park in recent months have resulted from park staff members responding to safety concerns instead of trained security personnel.
He did not fully elaborate on what those recent incidents were. However, Clay said that recently, a group of people on motorcycles gained access to the park, and because there was no security presence at the time of this happening, the group was able to ride through the park and endanger others. In an unrelated event, a 14-year-old who was walking through the park June 19 was shot in the thigh. No arrests have yet been made.
And in June 2023, he documented through cell phone video how a group of teens, two days before the pool opened, tried to climb over a one-story structure north of the pool to get in.
Clay said the Park Advisory Council has been raising concerns about security in Columbus Park for a year, and he felt the pool wasn’t adequately secured at the time of the incident. He has also said the problems at the pool were symptomatic of a larger problem – the city had not been hiring enough lifeguards and others to staff the area.
In response to recent incidents, Chicago Park District spokesperson Irene Tostado said in an email interview that the Chicago Park District is taking extra steps this year to maintain security and order at Columbus Park.
Tostado also wrote that the Chicago Park District will repair the fence line that was broken to access the park in hopes of preventing further incidents.
“This year, our security team plans to dedicate a security guard to be permanently assigned and posted at Columbus Park five-days a week, and assign a mobile security unit on special duty to patrol the grounds all 7-days of the week and on all watches,” Tostado wrote.
Columbus Park’s pool is closed on Thursdays, and closes at 6:45 p.m. on other weekdays. The pool closes at 4 p.m. on Saturdays and 4:45 p.m. on Sundays.
Clay said that the Park Advisory Council sees value in the pool being open later, but added that their requests to the Park District have been largely unanswered.
“We’ve been advocating for years that it opens until 8 or 9 o’clock to keep kids in the neighborhood busy,” Clay said. “But the kids are climbing the fence to go in the pool and as you know, that’s very dangerous.”
Tostado wrote that the Park District plans to maintain contact with the Chicago Police Department and park staff to maintain security and safety throughout emerging situations.
“The safety of our park patrons is top priority and we work closely with the Chicago Police Department to support our Park District Security team in keeping our parks safe for everyone,” Tostado said.