Residents and business tenants of the Hemisfair district have engaged the city and San Antonio Police Department in their push to make the area safer at night — including potential changes like better lighting, increased police presence and an enforceable curfew beginning at 11 p.m.
The move comes roughly nine months after the long-awaited reopening of Civic Park at Hemisfair, which has massively expanded the park’s footprint and drawn major crowds at events like April’s La Semana Alegre music festival.
Since January, Hemisfair has hosted roughly 150 events and the park itself has drawn nearly 5 million visitors, according to the Hemisfair Park Area Redevelopment Corp., a nonprofit aimed at revitalizing the area.
With that increased activity comes increased security concerns, particularly late at night.
While most city parks are closed between the hours of 11 p.m. and 5 a.m., Hemisfair is one of an handful that’s currently exempt, along with Alamo Plaza, Market Square, La Villita and part of the River Walk.
The Hemisfair Park Area Redevelopment Corp. gave the park operating hours of 5 a.m. to midnight but doesn’t have security staff to enforce it.
By taking Hemisfair off the list of curfew-exempt parks, police could issue a citation to people found there between 11 p.m. and 5 a.m.
A formal proposal is expected to come back before San Antonio City Council in August or September.
The Hemisfair district includes a children’s play area, Yanaguana Garden, as well as the high-end ‘68 Apartments and a restaurant corridor that’s home to Dough Pizzeria Napoletana, Bombay Bicycle Club and more.
The push for more security comes amid overall rising concerns about downtown crime.
This year a high-profile shooting at a Fiesta event in nearby Market Square left two people dead and four others injured, and last month an 80-year-old woman was killed by stray gunfire near Hemisfair after leaving a graduation ceremony at the Alamodome.
“This came to our attention after a couple of shootings around Fiesta,” Councilwoman Sukh Kaur (D1) said Friday at a meeting of the City Council’s Public Safety Committee. “A lot of the businesses have been reaching out to us and asking for help around increasing public safety at Hemisfair.”
The city’s Public Safety Outcomes Coordinator Maria Vargas-Yates said the number of 911 calls at Hemisfair have increased dramatically over the past year, with most of them initiated by an officer in the park.
But Police Chief William McManus said in an interview the area is hardly unsafe.
“Based on the numbers that we have and the stats that we pulled, it’s more of a perception issue than anything else,” he said. “Most of the calls that we have are minor in nature.”
Nevertheless, police presence was already increased around Hemisfair at night roughly two weeks ago, according to Assistant City Manager Lori Houston.
She said the city is meeting with Hemisfair’s business tenants, residents of surrounding neighborhoods, the police department and other stakeholders to gather input on broader safety solutions for the area.
So far, there’s been overwhelming support for a curfew, but the city still needs to figure out how to accommodate residents who live there and need to be able to access the area at night.
