Prostitutes are parading on Salt Lake streets in record numbers, overwhelming law enforcement, angry residents complained to the County Commission Monday.
Residents said the growing population of hookers has spread into residential areas between 900 South and 2100 South and State and Main streets."Businesses in the area are also upset," said Fae Nichols, chairwoman of the Peoples Freeway Community Council.
Elderly people and young families living in the area feel threatened by drugs and crime associated with prostitution. "Some of them (prostitutes) carry a handgun for protection, and you don't know when they will use it," Nichols said.
Another resident said a 10-year-old girl was propositioned by a man in a car as she walked home from school.
A delegation from the council complained to the Salt Lake County Commission on Monday, asking that the county quickly find some way to take prostitutes off the street for at least a few hours each evening to slow the flow of easy money and sex along south State Street.
Salt Lake Mayor Palmer DePaulis and Police Chief Mike Chabries met with the council last week, Nichols said, and board memberswere told the problem stems from an overcrowded jail - and the solution to that rests with the county.
The Salt Lake Police Department says the prostitute population has doubled in the past year to more than 200 along the Wasatch Front. The department said the growth is attributed to out-of-state hookers moving to Salt Lake City on news that business is good because the county's overcrowded jail has rendered enforcement efforts useless.
Authorities have said that officers may write a misdemeanor citation only to see the prostitute tear it in half and strut away.
"On occasion they will tear it up in front of the officer. But you can't do anything about it because it's not against the law to tear up a citation," said Lt. Marty Vuyk, spokesman for the Salt Lake Police Department.
He said if outstanding warrants on prostitution citations were paid it would bring in more than $200,000.
Vice squad efforts, however, are not always futile. Over the weekend, some space became available at the county jail, and 18 prostitutes were booked, the commission was told Monday.
With police and public pressuring the county for a solution, the commission did take some action this week. The three-member panel approved further expansion of the new jail now under construction in South Salt Lake and asked the sheriff's department to look into contracting for more space at a federal halfway house for women the county has been using near North Temple and Redwood Road.
While the response from the county and the high number of bookings over the weekend was good news for the Peoples Freeway Community Council, residents won't rest from their campaign against street walkers.
"We will persist so it (the momentum to resolve the prostitution problem) keeps up," Nichols said. "We realize we cannot eliminate the problem, but we would like to reduce it."
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Jail expansion approved
The Salt Lake County Commission answered pleas for more jail space Monday by giving the go-ahead for expansion of the Oxbow misdemeanor facility under construction in South Salt Lake.
Funding will come from an estimated $1.46 million surplus in the county's jail construction bond fund. The county will also have to come up with an additional $700,000 to have this latest addition completed along with the first phase by late fall 1991, Commission Chairman Mike Stewart said.
Final approval on the expansion will take place at a regular commission meeting later this month.
The expansion will mean an additional 184 beds to the 368 beds planned at Oxbow. The commission acted on advice from county planners and criminal justice coordinator Paul Boyden that beginning an additional third pod now would avoid a cost increases as high as 10 percent next year.
Despite the cost savings and badly needed jail space, the expedited expansion still falls 171 beds short of what is currently needed by county law enforcement agencies.