Brighter future for San Antonio Park

Oakland Tribune, Aug 4, 2004

SAN ANTONIO Park, the city's oldest park with 5 acres of priceless land in Oakland and topped with spectacular views, is the neglected stepchild of the city's Recreation Department.

It has been that way for 10 years.

But on Tuesday, a new day dawned over the park and recreation center, said Mike Hammock, assistant to Audree Jones-Taylor, Oakland's new director of recreation.

There will be a full-time director of recreation on the site Tuesday through Saturday from 10 a.m. to

7 p.m. Jose Ortiz, long a

recreation director known for innovative ways to involve kids in positive activities, has been named to the post.

Until Ortiz began work, San Antonio was the only one of 24 city recreation centers that didn't have a full-time director to supervise and be accountable for what happens. Immediately across the street are Roosevelt Middle School, teeming with up to 800 kids, and St. Anthony's Catholic school, with more than 200 younger children. They've been there almost forever.

A small recreation building that has been locked up most of this summer won't be completely returned to its intended use, but Ortiz will share it with La Mantia, a steel band that has a lease there until the spring.

The former director of recreation, Harry Edwards, made the lease as part of an arrangement with La Mantia that excluded other city uses.

An adjacent Headstart building is also locked up and unused because the program is on summer vacation.

A walk around the buildings Monday morning indicated the premises have been used as outdoor toilets, though there are restrooms that are supposed to be open for the public. There's an abundance of trash and evidence of illegal dumping.

I got the feeling this is an abandoned city recreation center. And from what the neighbors said, it has been for 10 years.

Activities pick up at noon and later in the afternoon, but residents say much of it is about dealing drugs.

That's the main reason Oakland police have two cars sitting in a parking lot across the street all day, almost every day, say the residents.

While at the park, I talked with Noel Gallo, city park supervisor, Oakland school board member and longtime resident of the community. He's also father of four children.

Gallo was unequivocal in his opinion that the facility must have a full-time recreation director who can pull together the young people and the community and get them involved in sports and other activities.

For the price of funding one Oakland police officer, Gallo suggested he could hire at least two directors for the recreation program.

Ortiz, formerly at the Lake Merritt Rotary Science Center and who is known for his earn-a-bike program, has a restoration plan that begins with getting rid of the trash that mars the beauty of Oakland's oldest park.

He plans to develop a phone list of volunteers to watch for and report illegal dumping -- a big problem -- and will collaborate with police and park rangers to rid the park of gangs and drug dealing, public drunkenness, prostitution and other crime.

Ortiz's vision is "to give back the park to the people of the San Antonio neighborhood."

This resonates with Ann Barnett of the San Antonio Neighborhood Association, which has a watch group to patrol the park.

"That's wonderful," she said when she heard there will be a full- time director of recreation. "We really need to see the park cleaned up."

Councilmember Danny Wan (At-Large) is pleased with progress made since Jones-Taylor took over the Recreation Department, according to Wan's chief of staff, Pat Kernigan, speaking for her boss, who is out of town.

There is plenty of work to be done to build the kind of wholesome community gathering place residents yearn for.

When we hear kids say they have nothing to do this summer and after school, that's true in the area surrounding San Antonio Park.

Finally, that is going to change.

E-mail Peggy Stinnett at

pstinnett@angnewspapers.com .