FREMONT — The East Bay Regional Park District will temporarily close a popular entrance to Mission Peak Regional Preserve Friday after Fremont officials sent multiple letters to the district requesting or demanding the closure, saying they were concerned about overcrowding and the risk of COVID-19 spread.

The Stanford Avenue Staging Area and trailhead will be closed off to the public beginning Friday evening, through Tuesday, April 21, park district officials said, and the district board will discuss the possibility of further closures at its meeting on April 21.

Mission Peak will remain accessible via the trailhead near the Ohlone College parking garage, a little more than a mile and a half north of Stanford Avenue. The board made the decision at a special meeting it held April 16.

People ignoring social distancing rules in county and statewide health orders while trying to get fresh air and exercise have previously forced closures of state park parking lots, or outright closures of whole park systems in some regions, such as San Mateo County, though the East Bay Regional Park District has kept the majority of its 73 parks open to date.

Fremont’s city manager Mark Danaj requested in an April 9 letter to the district board that the Stanford Avenue staging area and trailhead at Mission Peak be closed until one week after the shelter in place orders issued by both Alameda County and the state are lifted.

Danaj said city staff, Mayor Lily Mei, other councilmembers, and members of the community had noticed visitors to the Stanford Avenue staging area, parking lot, and nearby streets of Vineyard Avenue and Stanford Avenue are not complying with social distancing requirements in effect under the current health orders.

As a result of that letter, the park district board included the Stanford Avenue trailhead and staging area as part of it’s list of closures for the Easter weekend, but then reopened the area with a plan to further discuss the city of Fremont’s request at its April 21 meeting.

Fremont’s Police Chief Kim Petersen said in a follow up letter on April 13 that while the park district’s plans were “appreciated,” they didn’t go far enough to “provide the continuity required to mitigate the risk of spread of the virus,” and claimed that due to overcrowding, operating Mission Peak is in violation of of the county health order.

“I am ordering East Bay Regional Park District as the operator of the Mission Peak Regional Preserve to close the Stanford Avenue parking lot” and trails accessed from it, she wrote.

However, Carol Victor, the park district’s legal counsel, said at Thursday’s meeting “The police chief of the city of Fremont does not have the authority to close our park” and noted the county health department has not ordered the district to close any park.

“It is the observation of our staff that many people are social distancing, but there are some violations,” Robert Doyle, the park district’s general manager said Thursday.

Some board members, Like Dennis Waespi, appeared to take issue with the letters from Fremont officials.

“While I respect Fremont’s efforts to protect its residents…I think if the police chief really is interested in protecting the public, rather than close our parks, they may as an alternative, let us open our park, use our parking lot, there are 43 spaces there,” he said at the meeting.

If the parking lot fills up and Fremont officials think there are too many people coming to the park to be safe, Waespi suggested the Fremont police chief could expand a current weeknd and holiday parking restriction program along neighborhood streets near the staging area to seven days a week during the emergency.

“Then have those Fremont police officers enforce those rules, and I think you’d get the message across,” Waespi said.

Ayn Wieskamp, the board director who represents Mission Peak, said she agrees with the closure of the staging area, but cited sanitation as her main concern.

Because of the pandemic, the park district has shut restrooms across all parks, and had limited trash pickup due to short staffing during the pandemic, officials said, and concern for worker safety.

Wieskamp said she has been told by park managers at Mission Peak there has been “human waste on the streets in various locations, including in the back of the restrooms” and garbage strewn in the area.

“Frankly, this is a neighborhood,” she said. “It impacts their health, as well as anybody going by it.”

“Until we get bathrooms opened…safely done by our employees, and the garbage being picked up, this staging area should not be open. It is unsanitary and unsafe, that’s my belief,” Wieskamp added.

The Fremont City Council unanimously ratified Danaj’s letter at its April 14 meeting. One resident, Jannet benz, wrote to the council in support of the closure request, saying people visit Mission Peak “from far afield, causing overcrowding, and failing to practice social distancing.”

William Yragui, the co-founder of a park access advocacy group called Mission Peak Conservancy, said the Stanford Avenue staging area could be closed to reduce crowding, but the trailhead should remain open, because the trail entrance at Ohlone College “is much narrower.”

Prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, the Stanford Avenue staging area, trailhead, and neighborhood streets nearby had been the subject of sometimes contentious debate.

After a large number of residents in neighboring upscale neighborhoods complained that hikers and other park visitors often parked along curbs in front of their homes, sometimes blocking driveways, the city established a permit program that prohibits non-residents from parking on many nearby streets on weekends or holidays. The program is set to expire in July 2020.

When the park district approved plans in 2016 for a 300-space parking lot adjacent to the current 43-space lot, a group of neighbors sued the park district to stop it, but later settled in late 2018.

The park district is also currently negotiating a new lease with the city of Fremont, which owns the land the Stanford Avenue staging area is on. That lease agreement ends in July, as well.