Nature Center cleanup under wayMcAllen officials close park; police ask for ordinance
to combat illicit activitiesBy LUPE CHAVEZ
The MonitorMcALLEN -- As city crews clean up the McAllen Nature Center, city officials are considering an ordinance to cut down on illicit sexual and drug activity at the park.
The Nature Center, formerly the McAllen Botanical Gardens, will be closed in the coming weeks as crews from the city's Parks and Recreation Department clean bathrooms, remove syringes, condom wrappers, graffiti and other debris, city officials said Wednesday.
The center's closure this week followed a recent story in The Monitor that addressed problems at the park.
No city official on Wednesday gave a specific date for the reopening of the center. But when the park reopens, the McAllen Police Department would like a city ordinance that would give it more legal punch in dealing with alleged problems at the park, such as drug activity and prostitution.
''(We're) waiting for a city ordinance that would give us a little more enforcement,'' police spokesman Mitch Reinitz said Wednesday.
''We're thinking about it,'' City Manager Mike Perez said of a possible ordinance.
Increased enforcement would stem from citations of park visitors who stray from designated park trails, Reinitz said.
''A lot of people that go down these walking paths, if they get off them, then they could be cited and this would keep them from going off (the trails),'' he said.
Reinitz said Police Chief Alex Longoria would encourage officers to enforce such a new ordinance on a regular basis.
Area AIDS activists applauded the decision by the Parks and Recreation Department to close the park for maintenance as well as proposals to eliminate sexual activity at the center.
''I support the city of McAllen in their efforts to clean up the garden, making sure there's no needles and cleaning the bathrooms,'' said Andy Villa, of the Valley Aids Council.
Without extra police patrols when the center reopens, Villa said, city crews will have to clean up at the park again in two or three months.
''Cleaning is easy. Keeping it clean is the hard part,'' Villa added.
Other AIDS activists contend the center is the site of both male and female prostitution, a deadly foundation for the spread of AIDS.
''We'll never get rid of the prostitution, but we can balance it,'' Joe Arellano, a community advocate, said Wednesday. ''People will be upset or sensitive with the issue but they have to deal with it. ... From the negative it becomes a positive.
''The park was beautiful. What happened to it?'' Arellano wondered aloud.
Arellano and AIDS activist Frank Mendez said both residents and city officials must address the problems at the Nature Center so families will feel comfortable at the park again.
McAllen Mayor Leo Montalvo said Wednesday that the McAllen City Commission has not discussed a specific ordinance recently which addresses sexual and drug activity at the park since.
''What we have to do is clean up the place and make it more family oriented,'' Montalvo said. ''We need to improve the place substantially.''
Montalvo said he sees a need to improve the center, but he doesn't view the center only as a gathering place for illicit sex and drug activity.
''I've been there in the afternoons where people have barbecues and its pretty orderly,'' the mayor said.
Mendez said that he was under the impression that the city did not allow food at the center.
All of the activists would like to see the park as a family center again.
''The park was a place that people would like to visit,'' Arellano said. ''Somehow someone lost that and lost focus. Someone was not listening about what was happening.''