Tiny parks district in Sacramento County gives workers body cameras to ensure their safety

Employees at a small recreation and park district, one of the oldest in Sacramento County, are using body cameras to ensure their own safety after unruly encounters with the public while doing their jobs.

The Arden Manor Recreation and Park District manages facilities and offers services at three parks in Arden Arcade, including Deterding Park, Crabtree Park and Jonas Larkspur Park.

Kelly Lewellen, the Arden Manor district manager, purchased three body cameras for herself and two employees. She declined to provide specific details about what prompted her to buy the cameras, but said she wanted the cameras available to use for “any necessary reason.”

The district manager emphasized there were no significant criminal issues affecting district employees, its facilities or residents who participate in the variety of services they offer. She said 99% of their interactions with the public are cordial and result in no negative issues.

“There are just some bad actors out there who want to raise a raucous,” Lewellen said Thursday evening during a break at the district’s Board of Directors regular monthly meeting at the Deterding Park community center.

The Arden Manor district was formed in June 1953 to provide park and recreation services to residents of several newly formed subdivisions in the eastern suburbs. The district is bounded by Arden Way to the north, Watt Avenue to the east, Fair Oaks Boulevard to the south and Fulton Avenue to the west, encompassing an area of about 1½ square miles and serving roughly 8,200 residents.

It was just the second special district formed in Sacramento County. There are nine special parks districts in Sacramento County; the most in any California county. Arden Manor parks had 47 employees in its staff in 2022, according records kept by the State Controller’s Office. The district, which also rents its facilities for events, had an operating budget of $1.6 million for the 2023-2024 fiscal year.

Among districts with a similar amount of employees in Sacramento County, only Arden Manor has rank-and-file employees who use body cameras, a review by The Sacramento Bee found. Even the Orangevale Recreation and Parks District with 90 workers doesn’t have employees using body cameras.

The Sacramento County Regional Parks Department only allows its park rangers, who are law enforcement officials, to wear body cameras while on duty.

Crime in the district is low. There were no homicides or reported sexual assaults in the area in the past year, according to the Sheriff’s Office. According to the Sheriff’s Office crime statistics, the area had eight aggravated assault incidents and a handful of other assaults, as well as fewer than a dozen residential burglaries.

The Bee on Thursday spoke to a few residents who live near Deterding Park. They didn’t know the Arden Manor district had employees using body cameras, but they didn’t see anything wrong with it.

John Ingram-Stone’s family has lived along Somerset Road for more than four years, and they took their foster children to the swimming pool at Deterding Park a lot last summer. He said it’s a working-class neighborhood, and he’s never had any concerns for his safety there. So, he found it odd that parks district employees were wearing body cameras.

“I can’t imagine what they were up to that they felt the need to wear body cameras,” Ingram-Stone said. “More accountability is not a bad thing.”

Small cameras purchased online

The district manager said she purchased the body cameras with her own money, a few hundred dollars she spent on Amazon. They are not the type of body-worn cameras law enforcement officials wear on their uniforms. Lewellen said these are small cameras that can be worn on their clothing; she can clip it onto her belt.

Since she bought the cameras on her own, there is no district policy that the employees must wear them or use them while on the job, she said. They’ve had the cameras for about two months. She said her body camera has been on her desk, but she hasn’t used it yet.

“Just having them seems to be enough,” Lewellen said about the cameras. “It was something that just needed to be done.”

She bought the cameras for two maintenance employees who regularly work out in the parks in the early hours when the parks are less populated.

After discussing it with attorneys, Lewellen was informed the cameras she purchased on her own do not fall under record retention requirements for a public entity. The district manager said she and her employees can use the cameras at their own discretion and retain video footage when they feel it’s necessary.

Jeremy Cullifer, chair of the Arden Manor Board of Directors, said they are always working to make sure that district employees and residents visiting the parks are as safe as possible.

“Our parks are safe,” Cullifer told The Bee. “If my employees feel safer (using the body cameras), then I support their choices.”

Neighbors feel safe

Jaye Haleryn and her wife have been living along Berkshire Way for more than three years. The couple adopted a 4-year-old pit bull several months ago from Sacramento’s Front Street Animal Shelter, and they walk their dog daily to Deterding Park without any troubling encounters with anyone.

“Everybody here is super cool,” Haleryn said. “We feel super safe.”

She said they didn’t feel the same about where they used to live before. Haleryn worried neighbors there would not be friendly or at least supportive of LGBTQ couples. They found a diverse neighborhood when they moved into their Berkshire Way home, including Black families, Latino families and other gay couples who seem to get along.

She said she doesn’t have any concerns with park workers wearing body cameras, considering her own fears of confrontations in public as a result of being part of an openly gay couple.

“If you gotta protect yourself, you have to protect yourself,” Haleryn said about the body cameras.

Leslie Yocum has lived near Deterding Park for 67 years; first with her parents in a home on Somerset before moving down the block into the home that once belonged to her grandmother where she lives now.

She used to spend a lot of time at the nearby Arden Manor district facility, more recently participating in an aquatics program before she started using a walker to get around.

“I think it’s wonderful here,” Yocum said. “There’s big swim meets there each year. There’s always tons of kids.”

She said the district staff are friendly and responsive, so she didn’t know why they needed body cameras — but she didn’t have a problem with them being used. Yocum said she can imagine how there could be someone who continues to harass staff, which leads to such a drastic measure to protect themselves.