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After a Halloween night that saw hundreds of teens swarm D.C.’s Navy Yard, some city leaders say emergency curfews do help restore order, and they now want to keep them in place.
After a Halloween night that saw hundreds of teens swarm D.C.’s Navy Yard, some District leaders say emergency curfews do help restore order, and they now want to keep them in place.
The push comes after weeks of reported escalating disorderly conduct by juveniles since the summer emergency bill expired Oct. 5.
“These happen so quickly, within a matter of minutes, you have hundreds of kids,” Deputy Mayor for Public Safety and Justice Lindsey Appiah said Monday.
Appiah said the curfews were prompted this weekend after a large group of teens gathered Friday night, leading to fights and arrests. Unlike other recent gatherings promoted online as “takeovers,” the city had no advance warning of the Halloween event.
The large group had blocked an area around M and 1st streets, according to a news release from the police department.
Shortly after 8 p.m., the group of teens and young adults “increased in size,” and later broke out into fights and disrupted the flow of traffic. Police had urged other residents to avoid the area until it was cleared at around 11 p.m.
Once the curfew was enacted on Nov. 1, police stopped 18 teens for curfew violations, but no arrests were made. The teens were reunited with their parents.
“We don’t want to arrest a bunch of kids. That’s not what we’re looking to do,” Appiah said.
She’s urging the D.C. Council to reinstate a summer emergency bill that allows for daily curfews for kids under 18 and permits curfews to start as early as 8 p.m. in targeted zones. The curfew can last up to four days and be extended to 30 days, with additional orders from the mayor. If passed, the emergency bill would remain in effect for 90 days.
The emergency legislation also gave the police chief authority to set curfew zones without waiting for a mayoral order.
The council is expected to vote on the extension Tuesday.
“We believe that this is an important tool to have, that it’s worked,” Appiah said. “We cannot be in a position where we’re behind.”
Although the emergency legislation expired, Mayor Muriel Bowser issued a new public emergency order under her administrative authority. That allows her to impose curfews in urgent situations. The order created a citywide 11 p.m. curfew and allowed the police chief to set juvenile curfew zones starting as early as 6 p.m.
Appiah also addressed concerns from council members about data, saying curfew enforcement data is posted online weekly and that the drop in violations after curfews were enacted shows the policy works.
She said social media plays a role in organizing these gatherings, sometimes by adults seeking viral content.
Appiah responded to concerns about equity, saying curfews are “neutral” and that communities of color are often both impacted and victimized. That, she said, is why action is necessary.
“These tools are neutral, in and of themselves. The impact may be different because of a host of long standing reasons … that we’re not going to address with a single curfew tool. But we can’t fail to address what we’re seeing because of that. We need to work together on longer term systemic solutions to address those issues,” she said.
She said Bowser is also pushing for a permanent bill and is prepared to act again if the council vote fails.
“She’s mindful of that and will respond accordingly,” Appiah said.
DC Council reacts to curfew
Mayor Bowser ordered an emergency youth curfew, that could be extended beyond Wednesday if the D.C. Council takes action.
“We have some limited circumstances where young people are writing on social media where they’re planning to meet up to engage in fights or other problematic behavior,” said Council member Brooke Pinto, who is sponsoring the emergency curfew legislation.
The curfew would follow the same structure that the city saw over the summer, starting at 11 p.m.
Council Chairman Phil Mendelson told reporters on Monday that he was in favor of this emergency legislation after the weekend melee.
“This is not about locking up juveniles. This is about to deterring the behavior to congregate in large numbers and then vandalize,” he said. “This seems to be a fad with juveniles right now, they were doing it National Harbor, then it seemed to quiet down. Now, it’s reemerged as something that the juveniles want to do. ”
Pinto told WTOP that the summer curfew that was passed after incidents during the Fourth of July weekend had been successful during its 90 days.
“There were seven of these zones declared. In those zones, there were zero violations, zero arrests. Unfortunately, I moved an extension of that bill in October, and it was voted down by my colleagues,” she said.
Pinto remains optimistic that it will be passed this time around during Tuesday’s legislative meetings and later signed by the mayor and then reviewed by Congress.
“My hope is that can all happen before this weekend, so that the police chief can have this authority again, as is appropriate,” Pinto said.
The emergency curfew declared by the mayor will be active through Wednesday, Nov. 5, at 11:59 p.m.
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Luke Lukert
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