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A $2,000 reward is being offered for information leading to an arrest and conviction in connection with a July 7 fire that destroyed a play structure at Palo Alto’s Hoover Park.

Police and firefighters responded to the blaze on the east end of the park, located at 2901 Cowper St., at about 11 p.m.

Authorities arrived to find a jungle gym fully engulfed in flames, Detective Brian Philip said. Firefighters extinguished the fire as quickly as they could, but the structure was destroyed.

Residents in the area told police they saw juveniles in the park just before the fire. Investigators are working to determine whether the fire was arson, Philip said.

The city of Palo Alto and the nonprofit Friends of the Palo Alto Parks are offering a combined award of $2,000 for information about the fire.

Police urge residents to report any suspicious people or activity occurring in the city’s parks. Anyone with information about the fire can call Palo Alto police at 650-329-2413 or e-mail anonymous tips to paloalto@tipnow.org.

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12 Comments

  2. What’s up with Hoover park?

    I have heard of it before, but I could not recall ever having been there or where it was.

    I got on Google, and “googled” it … it does not even show up?

    I mean, it shows up from the air, but the street view is in the fourth dimension of something?

    In any case, this park is hardly even public … and I wonder who goes there and who lives there, and who it is for. Is this some kind of private hidden park for some bigshot in Palo Alto, or just an odd glitch in Google? There seems to be no public parking and the park itself is
    completely surrounded by houses and schools. It would be nice if they were so nice to the rest of Palo Alto that we all had hidden parks in our backyards.

  3. Anon,

    Hoover Park does appear if you go to Google Maps. The park has been there since the 1970s and plenty-o-people know it is there and use it. There is a dog run, tennis courts, cement wall, baseball diamond, basketball hoop, restrooms, Redwood trees, two play structures: one for toddlers, and the other (burnt one) for older kids.

    We visited the other day and the torched play structure is surrounded by chain-linked fences. Such a shame to see such a sight. What a complete waste of everyone’s time and money.

  4. Thanks for the info “Native PA”, but I was talking about Google street view. Have you ever used that. If you plunk the street viewer down on Cowper St. adjacent to the where Hoover park should be you see houses, not a park. It’s very odd … it is completely messed up, and I think they have the wrong picture there because El Dorado Ave goes right through Cowper. Google messed up.

  5. Anon,

    I rarely use that function because I am outside if I want to see places. The park is huge and cannot be missed in a blink of an eye. Write to Google and request that they fix it. I doubt many people have used that function so they probably have not had any requests. You might want to request that they take a photo of the torched playset also so you don’t have to visit the park.

  6. Anon, Hoover Park is not at all a “hidden park” for a “bigshot”. It is a large park that is a fundamental part of Midtown. El Carmelo Elementary School uses it for field trips, for example, quite often and I know it has also been used by CMT at Grace Lutheran Church.Little League uses it for baseball games and it has also been used for soccer games. As noted above, it has tennis courts, a dog run, a baseball diamond, and it had play structures.It is very sad that such an important park in the community should be the subject of arson.

  8. I took a look at the Google maps out of curiosity. The street view has Cowper Street correctly identified up to the intersection with Colorado, and after that it is off a block. What is purported to be Cowper is actually Kipling, and the Cowper Street houses are shown on Gaspar. I didn’t bother to look beyond that.

  9. Anon,
    That IS funny. Google mixed up that small section of Cowper with the next block over, Kipling. Try starting on Cowper by Dymond, which is just south of the park. As soon as you go over the creek the park vanishes.

    I suspect it was a case of the nerves as they neared the end of El Dorado by Cowper and came across a police cruiser.

  10. Anon, that’s some attitude you have going…

    I live in Midtown. We use Hoover park for softball practice weekly during the little league season. Every time I’ve been there it was full of people. Last I looked we were just regular folk and the park is very visible. I’ve been going there since I moved to this area over 20 years ago…

  11. You who failed to look at Google did not really realize the humor aspect of my post. Guess it’s never wise to overestimate people on the internet.

    >>> Posted by Koa, a resident of Mountain View, 3 hours ago: There is a whole world that exists outside of your computer.

    Yes, thanks for pointing that critical bit of information for me Koa … now that I look around I think I can see it … amazing, who would have thought? Do you suppose it’s real?

    Yes, Google messed up.

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