Removal of a filthy water feature at Chinatown’s Dr. Sun Yat-Sen Memorial Park should be completed by the end of November, giving hope to residents that the work will eliminate an unhealthy and unsafe haven in the neighborhood and draw more people to the Hawaii Theatre next door.

"People say there aren’t any public bathrooms in Chinatown — but they never looked at that park," said Ruth Bolan, president of the Hawaii Theatre Center. "It wasn’t really a fountain. It was a big swampy pond that, frankly, took up all the space. It was effectively being used as a public bathroom."

New city parks Director Michele Nekota approached the Downtown Neighborhood Board in September about removing the water feature at the 0.4-acre park.

The response was overwhelmingly positive, said board secretary Lynne Matu­sow.

"We had the homeless hanging around, urinating in the fountain, bathing in the fountain, pouring in soapsuds," Matu­sow said. "Sexual assignations were going on back there. Rats were hanging out in the thing, and evidently there were too many problems getting the fountain working. The feeling was that we needed to get the area cleaned up once and for all, and the fountain had to go."

Perhaps even worse, the water feature blocked the view of a young Sun Yat-Sen in a park named in honor of the ‘Iolani School grad (Class of 1882), who is often referred to as the father of modern China.

The water feature "posed a health and safety hazard to the community," Jon Hennington, spokes­man for the city’s Department of Parks and Recreation, said in an email. "The waters of the fountain have been repeatedly fouled, and the structure itself provided a haven for unsafe and potentially illegal activities."

Demolition began in October, and the work to replace the water feature with grass has proceeded only on weekends to lessen noise and traffic effects, Hennington said.

Once finished, the project is expected to cost about $20,000 "and will provide an open and safe park for the community and will add more prominence to the statute of Dr. Sun Yat-Sen as a boy here in Hono­lulu," Hennington said.

Earlier this year, when Bolan was considering the job of running the Hawaii Theatre Center as its president, she asked friends whether they took their children to the theater and was told, "‘We can’t walk through the park,’ because it was effectively being used as a public bathroom."

Four of the theater’s doors open up directly to the sight of homeless people often urinating into the water feature, she said.

"We would like to have that park be a beautiful, safe, open space where families can hang out during intermission," Bolan said.

City and theater officials are in talks about further improvements to the park, which Bolan believes will attract more people to the theater and to nearby businesses.