Is MacArthur Park safe for a picnic? LA DA says yes

Park 11 covered the recent MacArthur Park drug raids extensively, and now we're checking in a few months later. Residents there we talked with say the park is so much better now. In fact, get ready for a Labor Day weekend picnic with a special guest and his family, Park 11's Cristina Gonzalez, live now with that story. Cristina. Yeah. The district attorney, Nathan Hogman, back in June, you may remember, he made a promise during one of those big, you know, DEA LAPD raids that if the park got safer, because this wasn't supposed to be just a one time thing, they were going to continue enforcement that if it got safer by Labor Day, he would take his family on a picnic to the park. And I guess he feels things are safer. Watch. My family and myself, along with many of my colleagues in the Los Angeles County DA's office, friends, we'll be celebrating a picnic this coming weekend in MacArthur Park. You know what? I would love for him to come to this beautiful park, see what I see. And Juana Garcia sees a lot as she spends the day picking up trash in MacArthur Park. She and others who spend a lot of time here say things have gotten somewhat better since a highly publicized DEA LAPD enforcement action in June. There are real people who live all around Westlake, and this is their park, and they use it. It has some negatives. As I walk through, it's the east side of the park where people are doing open air drugs. Since approximately June, LAPD has instituted random patrols of MacArthur Park, and if you want to keep committing crimes in the park, then you're going to get arrested. LAPD crime bapping stats show over 130 responses at the park since June, mostly drugs and alcohol. And while there's plenty of visible drug use, there are sections of the park that look like this, and this, and this. Look at this. A few months ago, it was full of what I call zombies, you know, people that's in detention. The fentanyl zombies. But now look at it. It is better. It's so much better. By having a picnic on Labor Day weekend in MacArthur Park can keep the spotlight on MacArthur Park to both show progress with public safety, but the continual need to keep our vigilance high, then hopefully that's what the point of this picnic will be. Now people in the park suggesting to the DA that they bring lots of wipeys if they're going to come over to the park this weekend. And you know, and in all seriousness, the one thing we keep on hearing again from people in the park is that if they stop the needle and pipe giveaways, which they have several times a day in the park, the problem will get much better because those people will go away. That is the one thing I think that has yet to be enforced that I think people there definitely believe will make a difference. I'm Cristina Gonzalez in downtown Los Angeles did not get my invitation to the picnic, but if I do, I'll be there. Back in the studio.