Posted by call them, a resident of the Crescent Park neighborhood, on Sep 30, 2012 at 4:38 pm

Police in Palo Alto arrive within 10 mins of calling them even to something as minor as this. Call them, just don't use 911.

Posted by Jan H., a resident of the Old Palo Alto neighborhood, on Oct 1, 2012 at 2:21 pm
Jan H. is a member (registered user) of Palo Alto Online

Guess what? In the above-mentioned case of public drinking and child endangerment, four cell phone calls were placed to the police non-emergency number, all between 4:55 and 5:15 pm. Some callers waited until 6:00 pm for the police to show, as people were still drinking and toddlers drinking the adults' dregs. One person stayed long enough to report that one officer finally showed up around 7:00, after the offenders and their small children had all left! That is two hours! That is unacceptable. Also unacceptable is the fact that there is nothing in the police log about it.

Posted by Sharon, a resident of the Midtown neighborhood, on Oct 1, 2012 at 2:29 pm

Jan H. wants to be the PA version of Carrie Nations.

It is total abuse of PAPD resources to call 911 about such a trivial matter--PAPD has much more important matters to deal with-which they do

Hysteria seems to be the problem with Jan H.

Posted by palo alto mom, a resident of the Duveneck/St. Francis neighborhood, on Oct 1, 2012 at 2:42 pm

Sharon - PAPD has more important matters to deal with than toddlers drinking alcohol? And 911 was NOT used.

Since we tell people to leash and clean-up their dogs in the park, it seems reasonable to post no drinking signs too.

Posted by Sam, a resident of the Midtown neighborhood, on Oct 1, 2012 at 3:15 pm

>Since we tell people to leash and clean-up their dogs in the park, it seems reasonable to post no drinking signs too.

Who will enforce the rules? It is a long-time issue in Palo Alto: Pass a law, then fail to enforce it. Dogs off leash, leaf blowers and sit-lie ban are a few examples.

Prohibition had a lot of enforcemnt, and it worked, but the adults wanted a good drink, especially FDR. I don't think there is much chance of eliminating chardonay in our public parks...it is part of the current PA DNA.

Posted by Sharon, a resident of the Midtown neighborhood, on Oct 1, 2012 at 4:06 pm

There is a sign on the California Ave underpass which states-Walk You Bike-98% of bikers ignore it and the PAPD have much more important things to do.

[Portion removed by Palo Alto Online staff.]

In PA we do have a problem with non residents using our parks we should adopt either

1- no non PA residents-like Foot Hill Park

2-charge a fee for non PA residents to use our parks-the fee should be $15-20 per visitor per day.

This will solve the main problem

Posted by Unnecessary, a resident of the Midtown neighborhood, on Oct 2, 2012 at 9:58 am

No more posted signs in Palo Alto, we're on overload. There are so many that nobody bothers to read them anymore. In fact it is City policy to cutback on posting trivial and unnecessary signs, so don't hold your breath.

Posted by Jan H., a resident of the Old Palo Alto neighborhood, on Oct 4, 2012 at 10:39 pm
Jan H. is a member (registered user) of Palo Alto Online

Why is it a problem if non-residents use our neighborhood parks? They probably come from places that do not have safe parks for their children to play in. They probably live in places where they have no nice, grassy back yards for their children, either.

There are no signs stating that the parks require proof of residence, like Foothills Park does.

Howe er, there are obviously residents who do not know that alcohol on a playground is verboten; how else will they know if it isn't posted? Rinconada and Mitchell,Park have signs in the picnic areas stating that permits are required in order to bring alcohol onto the premises.

Unfortunately, you always have to allow for people who are ignorant of the law or who have no common sense.