Long Beach police swarmed a pickleball game this week, issuing dozens of citations to people they alleged were using the courts after hours and making too much noise.
Long Beach police spokesperson Eric Stachura said officers wrote 40 tickets to people at the DeForest Park pickleball court shortly after 11 p.m. Tuesday. He said the citations were for loitering or remaining at a park after hours.
Stachura said it was in response to “concerns from residents” about “loud activity in the park after hours.” He added that the group on Tuesday was “playing loud music.”
DeForest Park closes at dusk, but not everyone thinks there needed to be a law enforcement crackdown.
Hanzil Samad lives about 300 feet from the courts. He said he thought the police response was “a little bit too much.”
A poster on Reddit who said he was one of the people who received a citation was more blunt, calling it “excessive” that at least 20 officers showed up to write tickets.
He wrote that the court lights were still on and the gate was open. (The Redditor didn’t grant a request for an interview from the Long Beach Post.)
Most Reddit commenters sided with police and blamed the group for using the park outside of normal hours. But Samad said he likes to see the park active into the evening, as it has been since they replaced the old tennis court with a new pickleball court a few years ago. The courts and parking lot have lights that Samad said are regularly on at night.
As far as he knows, loud music and people playing late into the night haven’t been ongoing problems.
The only thing that’s bothered him is the occasional early bird trying to beat the heat by playing at 5:30 a.m., Samad said, but that hasn’t been enough of a nuisance to call police about.