TACOMA, Wash. — Point Defiance Park is known for its trails and views, but recently it's been known for violent crime.
"This troubling trend has got to get reversed,” said Joe Brady, deputy director of Parks and Recreation for Metro Parks Tacoma.
On Wednesday, a woman reported being attacked from behind and sexually assaulted at Point Defiance Park. In a separate attack in February, a different woman was attacked and stabbed while at the park.
According to the Tacoma Police Department, there have been five assaults and one sexual assault in the park this year. There have been 32 simple and aggravated assaults in parks in Tacoma so far this year, according to the police department’s crime dashboard.
“We certainly do not want this or any one of our parks or facilities to be a dangerous place for our community,” said Brady.
Brady said that in response to a trend of crimes, security cameras are going to be installed in the park in the new year. Metro Parks Tacoma said they will be monitored 24/7 and will also read license plates.
“We'll be going through our procurement and contracting process to install the security cameras that will not necessarily, I think, guarantee people's safety, but it will give the police department the resources that they can use to help fight crime,” said Brady.
Currently, the park has no security cameras. The park does have one to two security officers on duty at any given time, has one to two park guides working at a time who focus on code enforcement, and park volunteers.
Brady said that Metro Parks Tacoma puts more than $1 million per year towards security services at parks throughout the city. He said this amount has increased since 2020.
“Since the COVID era, that contract really exploded in terms of our need for an additional kind of security and safety presence in our parks,” said Brady.
The Tacoma Police Department currently has a dedicated unit patrolling Point Defiance Park in response to last week’s sexual assault. On a normal basis, the Tacoma Police Department said as a part of an officer’s shift, they may patrol the parks in the city.
After the February stabbing, mobile trailers with cameras were put up in the park but were taken down after three to four months.
“They weren't useful enough to the police department to provide the kind of data that they need,” said Brady.
Just last month, at Wapato Hills Park in Tacoma, another sexual assault was reported. Brady said cameras will be installed in multiple parks next year.
“We certainly don't have the fiscal resources to cover every single acre of every one of our parks with video coverage, we just don't have that resource,” sad Brady. “And so it's a calculus, we have to make tough decisions about where we're going to do things, and we've reached the decision that at Point Defiance Park, it's time.”
Neither the suspect in last week's Point Defiance sexual assault nor the suspect in November's Wapato Hills Park sexual assault have been arrested.