EDITORIAL: Eliminate county park police, expand Metro

Clark County has a park policing problem. And it costs taxpayers in inefficiency, damage and lost access.

The county has 107 parks, including 22 outside the urban valley. Those 107 parks cover 2,083 developed acres and 7,131 acres of open space at undeveloped sites such as Lone Mountain and Wetlands Park.

To cover all that territory, the county has its own park police force, which comprises all of 11 officers, four sergeants and one commander. Sixteen law enforcement officers can't possibly cover all that territory, especially when days off and shift changes are factored into staffing. They try anyway, crisscrossing the valley and relying on Las Vegas police to patrol and respond to outlying park space.

But Las Vegas police have their own manpower issues and aren't eager to claim park police jurisdiction as their own. This reluctant partnership has created a void that's most obvious at the Sunrise Trailhead at Wetlands Park in the east valley.

As reported last month by View reporter F. Andrew Taylor, the isolated trailhead at the south end of Hollywood Boulevard is quite popular with vandals, taggers and partiers, who have trashed the trail again and again.

"People have been burning the fence posts, the trees, the bathrooms and more," said Elizabeth Bickmore, program administrator for Wetlands Park. "It's a shame, because responsible people can't come out and use the facility. … This can be a lovely place."

More than $22,000 has been spent in the past year-plus cleaning up the trail, and volunteers donate a lot of time trying to keep up with the vandalism, but it's a futile effort. The trailhead frequently is closed. Not that such action keeps out the troublemakers. As reported by the Review-Journal, 19-year-old Geovany Garcia was killed and three people were injured in a shootout early Saturday after a huge party near the Sunrise Trailhead turned into a melee.

Clark County park police can't handle their charge. And if major crimes unfold in park space — such as a homicide — Metro is called to investigate regardless. What's the point in preserving such a small, inflexible police force to watch over such a spread-out territory at a cost to county taxpayers of $2.4 million per year? Why create jurisdictional confusion?

The County Commission should eliminate the park police and reallocate its entire budget to the Metropolitan Police Department to add more officers who can respond to all county parks and everywhere in between. Perhaps that would give Metro enough resources to check in on the Sunrise Trailhead more frequently. The park police certainly aren't going to do it.