Anchorage mom struggles to find safe park for kids amid ‘dying city,’ ruled by inebriates & drug addicts

”Mom, there’s homeless people all around this park. Can we please go somewhere else?”

Asked my six year old as we drove past Pioneer Park downtown around 3 p.m. this past Wednesday afternoon. 

He’s not heartless, but justifiably wary after a few years of running away from local parks due to disturbing circumstances: we’ve run into vagrants sleeping on the backside of the hill at Pioneer Park in late morning when we’ve come to play. One Sunday afternoon, after piling out of the van to spend a few minutes there before Mass, we left quickly after a fight erupted among drunkards on the Park Strip close to E Street.

This spring we stopped by Valley of the Moon park to play for a bit. The kids gleefully ran off toward the rocket ship only to be called back by mom when she realized there was a tent set up in the bushes by the parking lot, and a loud, violent fight was breaking out inside it.

When our local government refuses to enforce the laws on the books, then vagrants, public inebriates, and drug addicts rule the city.

Last summer, upon arriving at the Cuddy Family Park – you know, the one near the Loussac Library, which holds the Assembly Chambers – the same kid ran immediately to the volcanic-shaped climbing wall, only to be stopped dead in his tracks by the emergence of a half-naked, young Native man who had taken up residence inside the park structure. 

“I’d like to take you somewhere else, son…maybe we should head to Elderberry Park,” I responded, but then recalled a warm spring afternoon when we arrived at that park only to find the play structure vandalized with sexually explicit graffiti  (Kudos to Parks and Rec: they responded immediately and cleaned up the mess in less than 24 hours). 

I now do a drive by before stopping at any park in town, to make sure it looks safe for myself and my kids before stopping to play. But looks can be deceiving, which is why we’ve ended up in the above scenarios.

My tax dollars provide for the upkeep of all these parks, and my family is no longer free to use them because of the abject lawlessness that’s been fostered by our local government.

I loved Anchorage when I moved up here 24 years ago. Summer in the city was beautiful and inviting. The City of Flowers initiative spruced things up considerably, and I was happy to see smiling tourists walking around downtown, catching a glimpse of the city and state I sought out as my home. 

But each day I drive downtown, I wonder what the tourists think of our dying city where the Town Square has been transformed into a barren hill covered in sleeping bags, trash, and rudderless inebriates. I’m embarrassed to admit I live here, when I see visitors walking through as quickly as possible to avoid the squatting drinking parties that litter downtown sidewalks.

Businesses are hurting, families are hurting, and there’s no willpower in the local executive branch to prosecute the usurpers who are content to live off the public dole, driving our city deeper into chaos and destitution.

When our local government refuses to enforce the laws on the books, then vagrants, public inebriates, and drug addicts rule the city.

It’s time to recall LaFrance, as well as every Marxist member of the Assembly who’s voted time and again to sell out our city to anarchists rather than (simply!) promoting the common good.

If we don’t step up to save Anchorage, who will?

The views expressed here are those of the author.

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