Last month, we reported on the case of a strong-armed robbery that occurred inside Jefferson Community Center on Beacon Hill, where two teenage girls were attacked and robbed while hanging out in the center “having fun”. They said five teenage boys approached them, pushed them around and stole their backpacks off their backs before running off.
Today, Jonah Spangenthal-Lee at The Stranger reports on even more problems at local community centers:
Community centers are supposed to be safe places for kids, to draw them away from gangs and guns. Under the city’s Youth Violence Prevention Initiative, a $9 million program introduced by the mayor last year to reduce youth and gang violence in Seattle, some community centers will become a staging ground for targeted intervention and prevention programs designed to reduce youth violence by 50 percent. Community centers are supposed to be safe harbors for kids to take up basketball and tae kwon do—rather than assault and robbery—but that $9 million is spread over two years and only a fraction of it goes to community centers. For instance, several million will go the city’s Human Services Department for things like anger-management and youth-employment programs.
According to records obtained from Seattle Parks and Recreation, community centers in South Park and Rainier Beach and the Southwest Community Center in the Roxhill neighborhood have experienced problems with fights, gang graffiti, car prowls, and guns in the last three years. Police records from the last month also indicate problems at centers in Alki Beach, Lake City, and Yesler Terrace. Read more.
Jefferson Community Center on Beacon hill where two teenage girls were assaulted and robbed last month. Photo/do communications, inc.
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Seeing this last month made me really sad. Made me really question and ultimately decide that this community will not be a long term place for us to live and raise our children. I think things are going to change eventually, but we won’t be able to wait out the change.
I think this is a hard community for the younger population (and maybe the rest of us) to grow up in. I’ve decided not to take my children to any of the local community centers. I don’t teens, but I witness almost daily how the parents do their parenting (or lack there of) here. My friend discouraged us from visiting Jefferson after watching a mother viciously yell and then spank her toddler. My friend’s child was actually scared and had they had to leave. Violence begets violence if the cycle isn’t broken.
In the mean time, we are being active in the community and looking out for our neighbors. It’s the least we can do
This is nothing new. I grew in a relatively affluent neighborhood on the east coast, the local youth center was a den of drug dealing and trouble.
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