SEQUIM — A fence could be fine around the skateboard park, said Alan Lewis, 16.
“It would be good to keep rocks out,” Lewis said.
“There would be less injuries. See those little rocks? They hurt you.”
The Sequim City Council discussed fencing the skateboard park, inside Carrie Blake Park, 202 N. Blake Ave., during its Monday meeting.
But Councilman Paul McHugh and Mayor Walt Schubert weren’t referring to rocks when they raised the barrier issue.
They were talking trash.
Too much of it is left lying around the parking lot, said Public Works Director James Bay.
And pipes and other objects, used for jumps and such, are too often found in the skateboarding area.
“We remove that stuff all the time,” Bay said.
“I don’t think we need to keep cleaning up and removing things,” said McHugh.
And if skateboard park users continue leaving debris behind, the council should consider closing the park, he added.
“I think we should consider very strongly putting up a fence so we have some control,” said Schubert.
‘Thumbing their noses’
Councilman Bill Huizinga sounded dismayed by the direction the discussion was taking.
“We say we want things for kids to do, and then we say we’re going to shut it down?” he asked. City workers clean up the little children’s’ playground, he added.
But the denizens of the skateboard park have been “thumbing their noses at the rules” since it opened, said Councilwoman Patricia Kasovia-Schmitt.
“They were told they couldn’t use it at night, and they parked their cars to shine their lights on it,” she said.
A fence — with a gate that could be locked to close the park for a period of time — would be “like a time-out for a child,” she added.
Such a fence would cost about $8,000, Bay said.
