By Amanda Estes
Staff Writer
A visit to South Portland’s Willard School Park on a sunny afternoon will reveal families enjoying a chance to get outside, as their children crawl over, under and through the park’s new playground equipment. While the improved section of  the park may be more family friendly, some residents are fed up with the noise, smoking, drinking, swearing and loitering occurring along the park’s border with Cottage Road.
South Portland Police Officer Jeffrey Caldwell said the park has been a popular hangout with teens for as long as he has been with the department – nearly two decades.
“When I first started, you couldn’t walk through the park without bumping into somebody,” he said.
Caldwell recalled seeing groups of between 30 and 50 kids in the park at night and said some residents on the west end of the city would drive their kids to the park and drop them off so to spend time with friends.
Caldwell said the complaints begin when school lets out for the summer. He said most of the complaints are noise related and patrols of the area frequently uncover alcohol violations.
A few weeks ago, an officer discovered an 18-year-old living in his vehicle, Caldwell said. He said there was so much smoke from marijuana in the vehicle the officer couldn’t immediately see the person inside.  
For Vernon and Ellen Ross, recent vandalism to their brand new vehicle punctuated nearly a year’s worth of frustration with the park and the large group of teens that congregate there. On Sept. 8, the Ross’ called the South Portland Police Department to report someone had poured paint on their car sometime between 11:15 and 11:30 p.m. They estimated the damage to be roughly $2,000.
Vernon Ross said they have an idea who is responsible for the vandalism because they saw an individual walk down the street twice on Sept. 9, with a “smirk” on his face as he looked at the vehicle.
Caldwell said residents who call to complain about noise or other issues in the park are often targets for vandalism and their houses or vehicles “get egged.”
The Ross’ complaint, however, is of a more personal nature. They say the vandalism to their vehicle was retaliation for their efforts to keep their 15-year-old son away from the people and activities in the park.
During the last year, Ellen Ross said they watched their son transform from a Boy Scout and band member, who enjoyed writing music, to the young man who came home with a broken nose and cigarette burns on his body. At one point, he had to be rushed to the hospital with a blood alcohol level of more than .246.
While Ross said she and her husband initially invited a couple of the kids who frequent the park into their home for dinner, she became concerned when they began assuring her they wouldn’t do anything to hurt her son. She said, at first, she and her husband were mad at their son for spending time with the group, but they later realized that he didn’t know what he was getting into.    
Concerned for their son’s safety, they enrolled him in a wilderness therapy program for troubled teens. He is currently attending a boarding school.
Ross said their 10-year-old son is anxious about walking home from school and she cannot go near the park without being harassed.
“We’ve lived in this house for 25 years and we’ve seen different phases with different kids, but this is the worse,” said Vernon Ross.
“The park has been open for years and has been a place that the juveniles in the area have congregated in for years,” said South Portland Police Lt. Frank Clark.”[Officers] routinely enforce the city’s ordinance which states no one is allowed in the city’s parks after 9 p.m.”
Clark said officers attempts to move people out of the park at night are usually met with cooperation. He said the department receives similar complaints about Hinckley Park and the park near High Street and Sawyer Street and said the Willard School Park may appear to be more of an issue because there are more families and kids living in the area.
Last year a group of residents concerned about the park’s condition, organized and formed the Friends of Willard School Park.
“The neighbors have gathered around and decided that they’re not going to go around with a stick beating people away,” said Mayor Claude Morgan, a Cottage Road resident. He said his first act as an elected official was to meet with the Friends group to discuss the park’s future.
The group requested input on designs to make the park more appealing for residents of all ages and was successful in obtaining a Land and Water Grant for $22,500.
The grant helped secure the new playground equipment, which has already been marked by graffiti, said Scott Akerman, a member of the Friends group.
The next set of improvements are geared toward a community park that serves as the gateway to Willard Beach, said Akerman. He said the plan includes gardens, picnic tables and a stage area with the potential for performances. The addition of beach grasses, hosta plants and trash cans will make the area more aesthetically pleasing and more user friendly, he said.
“I don’t think they appreciate how much effort we actually put into this thing,” he said. “We all were teenagers so we feel bad, but there are probably 15 or 20 kids that have nothing to do and they do congregate there.”
Akerman said a round of neighborhood polling showed some residents avoided the area because they felt intimidated. He said no one seems to know what the solution is.
South Portland School Resource Officer Allen Andrews declined to comment on the matter.
While the Ross’ have encountered empathy from some neighborhood parents, they are really hoping parents will step in and take an interest in what goes on in the park.
“Enough’s enough,” said Ellen Ross. “It was us on Saturday, it could be anybody else at anytime now.”