‘I’ve never seen it to this level’: Spokane officials try to keep up as vandalism on the rise at Riverfront Park

While Riverfront Park is largely clean and tidy, secluded areas and certain art pieces have become prime targets for vandalism at the city’s central tourism draw, according to Spokane Parks and Recreation officials.

Spokane Park Ranger Supervisor Jacob Vandenberg said he’s worked in the park ranger program for about eight years and noticed an uptick in vandalism, especially in the past year. The statistics back that up.

“Graffiti is becoming much more popular than when I started here,” Vandenberg said. “I don’t have an answer why. I wish I knew.”

Vandenberg said rangers responded to 291 calls for altering park property, malicious mischief, vandalism or graffiti from 2020 to mid-April of this year at Riverfront Park. He said the actual number of incidents is much higher because parks maintenance staff often cleans and repairs spray-painted surfaces and other damages before they enter the vandalism as a call for service.

Vandenberg said one of the head parks maintenance workers recently started documenting graffiti incidents at Riverfront Park. In a two-month period from mid-February to mid-April, they recorded 60 “significant” incidents of graffiti.

Maintenance staff typically allocates 60 hours per week for graffiti and vandalism cleaning and repairs in Riverfront Park alone, according to Vandenberg.

“I’ve never seen it to this level where our maintenance staff has to be so focused on doing cleanup instead of working on improvements,” Vandenberg said.

Spokane park rangers primarily patrol Riverfront Park and venture into other parks after patrolling Riverfront and when funding allows, Vandenberg said. He said they mostly respond to minor crimes at the park that Spokane police don’t have the time or resources to cover.

As limited commission officers through the authority of Spokane police, Vandenberg and other park rangers can enforce certain criminal law violations, like malicious mischief and theft, and city municipal code violations, like unlawful camping and speeding bicyclists and scooter riders.

Starting last year, people found in Spokane parks after hours could be arrested on a misdemeanor, a step up from the previous civil infraction.

Much of the vandalism at Riverfront Park is graffiti, often done by juveniles in “tagging competitions,” or spray painting in the most remote or unique places, Vandenberg said. Vandalism happens at all hours of the day, but it seems most prevalent at night.

He said the uptick in vandalism is seen this time of year, when temperatures rise and the park becomes busier.

Parks Director Garrett Jones and Vandenberg said patrol hours and park ranger staff will increase with summer around the corner. Vandenberg said 10 part-time rangers will help the four full-time rangers patrol parks this summer, with the goal of patrolling 24 hours a day if budgeting allows.

He said park rangers sometimes catch vandals redhanded, and other times surveillance cameras help rangers catch their suspect.

Most of the vandalism happens in areas of the park hidden by trees and bushes, like Stepwell and the conservation area next to it, as well as under the Washington Street bridge on the north edge of the park.

“If it’s open and easily accessible by the public, it doesn’t have as many problems,” Vandenberg said.

The natural area next to Stepwell had spray-painted graffiti on the thin trees and trash on the ground last month. Vandenberg said the area is typically littered with trash the day after maintenance staff cleans it.

Graffiti has been a problem at the Stepwell, intended to be the park’s signature art piece, since shortly after the city unveiled it in April 2023. A chain link fence surrounded the roughly half-million-dollar art piece for months in 2023 to protect the wooden structure from rampant vandalizing.

Designed by internationally renowned architect, designer and educator J. Meejin Yoon, the structure was intended to provide expansive views of the natural formations in the park, as well as a quiet, contemplative space to read, eat a meal outside or rest in the middle of the 100-acre park.

Stepwell’s laminated Alaskan yellow cedar was coated with a stain meant to make it easy to remove graffiti from the surface. But that coating has not done as well as anticipated, so graffiti is still evident after cleaning, said Fianna Dickson, communication manager for Spokane Parks and Recreation.

Dickson said the city has been working with Yoon to find the best solution for long-term cleaning and maintenance of the structure.

A silver chain locks the black gate around the Stepwell for public safety.

Dickson said a structural engineer is going to examine gaps that formed between some of the wood panels.

A short walk from the Stepwell, the Limerick Irish Harp sculpture at the Sister Cities Association of Spokane Connections Garden has also been prone to vandalism, Dickson said.

Since August, a chain link fence cordoned off the sculpture after the glass protecting the piece shattered.

The fence was recently removed after the city spent about $6,600 to replace the glass, Dickson said.

She said the city reported to police the initial broken glass, which was believed to have happened overnight, in April of last year. A second round of damage to the piece’s glass was more significant, and the city fenced it off to protect the public.

Costs to repair the glass initially came in higher than anticipated, so the city put the project on hold before getting a more favorable quote.

“In a public park, public artwork can be problematic in this way in terms of being a target for vandalism,” Dickson said. “It may mean that we need to look longer-term if this happens again.

“If it continues to happen, we may need to work with the artist (of the harp) and the Sister Cities Association to find an indoor or alternative location in the park for this piece.”

Perhaps the biggest problem area park rangers patrol is “A Place of Truths Plaza” and the steep hillside below it between the Monroe Street Bridge and City Hall. The plaza is a Spokane Falls overlook area on Spokane Falls Boulevard north of the Spokane Public Library.

Vandenberg said vandalism, graffiti, littering and drug use are prominent in that area.

The city municipal code dictates use or distribution of drug paraphernalia results in a one-year ban from parks, he said.

“We’re really just taking a hard stance on drug paraphernalia in the park,” Vandenberg said. “We don’t want kids coming and stumbling across this stuff.”

The hillside is often littered with trash, and a park bench at the plaza was heavily burned last month.

Parks maintenance staff picks up trash every day at the plaza, Dickson said, but the steep hillside is more challenging.

It’s usually completely cleaned three or four times a year, but specific segments are cleaned more frequently as needed, Dickson said. Extremely steep sections require harnesses to clean, and watercraft are needed to clean the riverbanks.

Jones said the city often works with outside organizations to pick up the trash on the slope, but it’s often littered again immediately after cleaning. Vandenberg said he’s seen people walk up to the railing of the plaza and throw trash down the hillside.

“It’s frustrating,” Vandenberg said. “Try to catch them when you can, but it’s challenging.”

Last month, Vandenberg and fellow park ranger Jacob Stout encountered a man who started a campfire near the bottom of the Monroe Street Bridge along the Spokane River. They cited the man, who had previously been trespassed, on suspicion of misdemeanor criminal trespass.

Vandenberg said park rangers have an “ongoing history” with the man, and they often interact with the same people in that area and Riverfront Park.

He said they try to build rapport with them, which often leads to positive interactions.

In addition to park rangers, the city hired additional night security to help patrol the plaza area because of the increased “negative activity,” Jones said.

Vandenberg is one of four full-time park rangers, but that number could quadruple to about 16 if a Spokane parks levy and a Spokane Public Schools bond pass in November, according to Jones.

After voters rejected an SPS bond last year, school leaders worked with park officials to craft two ballot initiatives – a 20-year, $240 million parks levy and a five-year, $200 million SPS bond – to pay for more projects for less money than if the city park system and school district crafted plans separately.

Jones said he wants to take the Riverfront Park-centric park ranger program and expand it so rangers can patrol other parks as well as play spaces outside schools during after-school hours and weekends.

The levy also calls for additional modes of transportation for rangers, like an all-terrain vehicle, to patrol parks. They currently use a pickup truck and bicycles.

“We heard that loud and clear from the public: We love our park spaces, we want them updated, but we also want them clean and safe, and we want a better level of service,” Jones said.

The levy would also add parks staff and resources to address vandalism, graffiti and illegal dumping in parks more quickly.

Jones said park restrooms are often closed for long periods because of vandalism.

“In some cases, the vandalism is so bad that we don’t have the resources now to open that restroom back up,” Jones said.

Dickson said maintenance staff would love to spend their time doing routine maintenance to take care of the parks rather than fixing vandalized toilets, removing graffiti from surfaces and repairing playground slides damaged through nefarious activities.

“Those are certainly the last things that our teams want to be working on,” she said. ” … Those actions take public spaces away from use by all, and that’s what they’re intended for, obviously.”