When it comes to safety, Children’s Park in downtown San Diego has a rollercoaster history. Recent budget cuts by the city to security staffing have some Marina District residents and park staff fearful of a downward turn for the worse.
As part of budget reductions for the fiscal year 2026, one million dollars in security services were reduced throughout the city of San Diego’s parks system. The overnight security shift at Children’s Park got the ax, according to City of San Diego Supervising Public Information Officer Benny Cartwright.
Current park security staff said elimination of a night-shift guard has brought unwanted visitors to the park. They reportedly sleep on children’s play equipment and create overnight messes that can take hours to clean up in the morning.
Two security guards at Children’s Park spoke to The San Diego Sun on the condition of anonymity.
“When I was on the night shift nobody was sleeping on these benches or in the park,” said one security guard who has worked at Children’s Park for a year.
The guard says the night-shift job entailed actively shooing away people who came into the park when it was closed, from 10 p.m. to 6 a.m.
“I knew there would be problems when they cancelled the night shift,” the guard said. “People came at night as soon as they knew I wasn’t there.”
Another relatively new security staffer who works the morning shift said the park is regularly filled with overnight sleepers who leave trash in the morning.
“Teenagers are sleeping everywhere when I get here a little before 6 a.m.,” the second guard said. “They’re on top of the equipment. Mostly in groups of threes. They leave all kinds of trash, including blankets and broken alcohol bottles.”
The morning shift guard said it can take two people (including a maintenance staffer) up to two hours to clear the park and clean up the mess before families and dog owners start arriving at roughly 8 a.m.
“People don’t normally see the mess from the night before because we work as fast as we can to get the park back into shape,” that morning shift guard said.
The San Diego Sun was shown photographs of people sleeping on park play equipment.
On Wednesday (December 17) before 6 a.m., The Sun arrived at the park and found no sign of people or trash.
The morning guard indicated that was an anomaly. “On a recent Friday, I came to work and found a man sitting in the park smoking a meth pipe,” the guard said. “He was yelling at the people sleeping in the park that he was going to kill them.”
No drug paraphernalia has been left on the grounds to date, but the morning guard said the situation is getting worse.
Since the reduction of security services, the Parks and Recreation Department is not aware of an increase in reports related to vandalism, graffiti or unsheltered overnight activity, according to the city’s Cartwright.
He encouraged residents to report criminal behavior to the San Diego Police Department or the city’s Get It Done app.
Children’s Park opened in 1995, ahead of the next year’s Republican National Convention at the nearby San Diego Convention Center. The park was only partially aimed at welcoming youngsters. The primary feature was a shallow water basin called the Civic Pond, which had a dancing waters attraction that regularly malfunctioned.
For decades, the park, which had shade trees covering oddly designed grass mounds, was primarily used as a hangout by homeless individuals and was rife with drug usage.
The current version of Children’s Park was redeveloped and reopened in November 2023. The $9-million project came with a largely wooden children’s play area, picnic tables, adult exercise equipment, an off-leash dog area, public restrooms, an attendant booth, a multi-use lawn and a new walkway through the Civic Pond.
At a 2023 grand opening event, San Diego Mayor Todd Gloria said: “…we have transformed a previously underused space into a truly vibrant place for the community.”
Also at the grand opening, District 3 San Diego City Councilmember Stephen Whitburn noted: “This park, in the heart of downtown, is a testament to what we can achieve when we come together as a community to improve the quality of life for all residents.”
Gloria and Whitburn did not respond to requests for comment for this story.
Saying they were promised round-the-clock security at the park, some residents now feel betrayed. Many believe 24/7 security is why Children’s Park opened as a successful, safe, clean and family-friendly spot.
In a San Diego Union-Tribune letter to the editor, Marina District resident Victor Ravelo blamed the security cutbacks on Mayor Gloria’s attempts to reconcile a quarter-of-a-billion-dollar city budget deficit.
Ravelo wrote: “…imagine what is going to happen with the homeless at night and our children coming to play the next day! It is not right. It is unsanitary and criminal to expose them to who knows what will be at park grounds in the morning.”
New Marina District resident Kathryn Holt uses the Children’s Park Dog Run a couple times a week.
“Security is important and they should bring back the night shift,” Holt said. “I don’t want my dog eating something off the ground that was left here overnight that could kill him.”
Cheryl Dell’Anno lives a block away from Children’s Park and takes her grandson to play on the equipment several times a week. She shook her head at the idea of budget cuts creating an unsafe environment.
“Don’t take money from the kids,” Dell’Anno said. “It’s not worth it. Find something else.”
Jenelle Hawkins lives near downtown’s Seaport Village. She takes her five-year-old son to play on the park’s big sliding board, and runs a Marina Moms Group text chain on WhatsApp with roughly 40 participants.
“Before the park opened we were all waiting and waiting for it,” Hawkins said. “Before it opened the only space we had was a very small spot, with two swings, in front of The Children’s Museum. We were always getting harassed there by homeless people.”
When Children’s Park opened Hawkins and her group were excited to have a fence-enclosed park with security.
Hawkins hasn’t seen or heard of any issues since the overnight security was eliminated. She’s never there in the early morning, and said finding drug needles or broken glass is one of her fears.
“I guarantee you if that starts happening you’ll hear from a lot of complaining moms,” she said. “Our kids should be the last thing affected by budget cuts.” SDSun
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