City temporarily closes troubled Seattle park while gates are installed

SEATTLE — Hoa Mai Park in Seattle's Little Saigon neighborhood has been temporarily closed while city crews install new fencing and gates.

The park is less than a year old but has become a hotspot for drug use and vandalism.

“We quickly learned this park was not for us," said Tanya Woo, an advocate for the Chinatown - International District and former Seattle city councilmember. "We quickly lost it to blatant drug use. We want to go back to how this area used to be.

When the park opened, it was celebrated as a major improvement for Little Saigon, adding community gathering space and play areas for children.

Within weeks of the park's July 2024 opening, neighbors began raising the alarm about rampant drug use and violence in the park.

"Since the park opened it has become a location where subjects sell and use illegal narcotics, among various other illegal activities," a September 2024 Seattle police report states.

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The park is near the intersection of 12th Avenue and South Jackson Street, which has been the scene of several violent crimes including a mass stabbing last fall.

With the park temporarily closed, several people who were staying in the park told KOMO News they have moved out onto King Street.

“A lot of the people who are out here would be in there," said Danny Sullivan, referring to the now-fenced-off park. ‘When you constantly have the police saying ‘you can’t stand on the sidewalk, you gotta keep moving - where we moving to? We don’t have anywhere to go. Then we go to the park and y’all come to the park and kick us out of the park.”

The city did not indicate a timeline for how long the gate installation will take.

The park hours are from 4:30 a.m. to 11:30 p.m.

Woo, the community advocate, said gates are a step in the right direction, but she hopes the city will enforce the park hours and close it at night.

"This is what we've been advocating for for a long time," Woo said. “We need to make sure there are people coming in to close the gate every night, and they can move people out.”

The park is two blocks from the Navigation Center, a homeless service facility with low-barrier entry. The Navigation Center is scheduled to close and relocate to downtown Seattle by the end of this month.