‘It is complete anarchy’: Denny Blaine for All spokesperson says Seattle is ignoring judge’s orders at notorious nude beach

A judge ordered Seattle to crack down on illegal sexual activity at Denny Blaine Park. A month later, community leader Lee Keller said the city hasn’t done a thing.

Keller, the spokesperson for the group Denny Blaine for All, told “The Gee and Ursula Show” on KIRO Newsradio that conditions at the park have only gotten worse since King County Superior Court Judge Samuel Chung issued a permanent injunction in July.

“It’s pretty bad,” she said. “I mean, honestly, it’s complete anarchy.”

Chung found that illegal sexual activity at the park had become a public nuisance and ordered the city to develop a park-specific code of conduct, boost staffing and maintenance, improve signage and landscaping, and create better buffers between the park and neighboring homes.

“It is our firm belief right now that the city is sort of literally thumbing its nose at the court,” Keller said. “The court actually did say that the city needed to do something to abate the nuisance that’s going on.”

Keller described a weekend gathering at the park that she said the city knew about in advance because police had alerted the neighborhood group it was going to happen. But she said no action was taken to prevent it.

“The people came down. They tore down fences. They defaced the park,” Keller said. “The city knew about it because the police are the ones that told us it was happening in the first place, and they didn’t do anything to prevent it.”

‘Nobody wants to be in a neighborhood where trespassing is OK’

Keller said the problems extend far beyond nudity. She described trespassing on private docks, property destruction, and open sexual activity in the park.

“It’s not a safe environment, regardless of how lovely a neighborhood it is,” she said. “Nobody wants to be in a neighborhood in any part of any city where people are running around trespassing and having sex on their front yard. Nobody wants to be in a place where trespassing is OK, where property destruction is allowed, where laws are not being enforced.”

She said the fence the city installed as part of its initial response to the judge’s orders has been ineffective.

“The fence has not worked,” Keller said. “The fence isn’t even a permanent fence. It’s like a chain-link fence with some green material in it, and it’s been defaced, it’s been destroyed, parts of it have been ripped down, it’s not been respected.”

She added that the fence had an unintended consequence.

“The city put up a fence that initially gave the masturbators privacy to go down by the water and masturbate,” Keller said.

KIRO host Gee Scott asks about enforcement at other parks

Gee asked Keller whether sex and masturbation happen in other Seattle parks, and whether the city is treating Denny Blaine differently.

“Well, I don’t personally check for that in other parks. I don’t know. I can’t tell you,” Keller said.

Gee pressed further, asking what Keller thinks the city should be doing at other parks if the same behavior is occurring there.

“They should be saying, ‘Move along, folks. This is not legal activity,'” Keller said. “So that’s exactly what they should be doing at Denny Blaine.”

She pointed to the broader instability in city leadership.

“We have a police chief that was recently fired,” Keller said. “We have a mayor that — things feel a little out of control, and I’m not the only one saying that. Police staffing is down. I don’t know what’s going on in other parks, but certainly what should happen is that if there are people having open sex and masturbating in public, they should be told to stop. They should be told that is illegal.

‘We’re not saying everybody who goes down there is causing a problem’

Ursula noted that some listeners were disputing Keller’s characterization, including one who said the fence was torn down accidentally and that the illegal activity is not as widespread as Keller described.

Keller acknowledged there are bad actors who have ruined the park for everyone.

“I do think that there are some bad actors and bad players that have ruined it for everybody, whether these are legal parkgoers or neighbors,” she said. “We’re not by any means saying that everybody who goes down there and behaves legally is causing a problem. Obviously, they’re not.”

But she said the bottom line hasn’t changed.

“The one thing that I would like people to remember is that actually the city is supposed to be complying with the law and the court order, and they have literally done nothing,” Keller said. “Nothing.”

What the group actually wants

Ursula asked whether the goal is to shut down nudity altogether. Keller said no.

“It’s the intention of this group to have a park restored to what it should be and what it has been historically, which is a family-friendly park that welcomes everybody,” she said. “That’s all these neighbors have ever been asking for.”

Gee asked Keller what year the park was at its best.

“I believe it was like the 1950s,” she said. “There are people that grew up down there and had children down there, and people would take their picnics and go there for an evening swim and a lovely picnic, and that’s not happening now. It’s not a family-friendly place at all.”

Gee had a response to Keller’s statement: “In the 1950s, not everybody was allowed to be in that park.”

Watch the full discussion in the video above.

Listen to Gee and Ursula on “The Gee and Ursula Show” weekday mornings from 9 am to 12 pm on KIRO Newsradio.