Wichita adds 5 crimes that can get ‘problem people’ banned from Old Town

The Wichita City Council has added five municipal crimes that city prosecutors can use to ban what police call “problem people” from the Old Town Entertainment District.

The city can now ban from Old Town anyone caught in public — specifically, in Old Town — urinating, defecating, being nude, having sex or engaging in other sex acts, or exposing themselves without consent.

The change imposes a $500 mandatory minimum fine for any of those crimes, if committed in Old Town. In addition, anyone caught in Old Town after being banned “shall be punished” by a maximum fine of $1,000 or by imprisonment up to one year, or both, according to the ordinance approved by the council Tuesday.

Mayor Lily Wu pressed the law department and police department on whether there was any increase in those particular crimes. Neither department could say, and neither had any specific data prepared for the council meeting.

“Obviously, crime in Old Town or downtown is of high priority to everyone in our community,” Wichita police Captain Aaron Moses told the council on Tuesday. “It’s something we hear a lot about. Certainly the perception of crime in the Old Town and downtown area is something we hear a lot about.”

“How often has this really been an issue in the Old Town area?” Wu asked.

Moses was unable to point to any recent incidents involving the five new crimes added to the list. But he mentioned a need to make people feel safe in the aftermath of an attack near Naftzger Park in May, when a homeless man allegedly punched one woman in the face and kicked another in the stomach at Douglas and St. Francis after a concert.

“We all saw incidents in the last six months that draw extreme public attention to the Old Town area, and we certainly feel that any additional restriction that we can place to make people feel safe in that area is important,” Moses said. “I’m speaking specifically about a case where a woman was battered in the Old Town area. That drew a lot of public attention. And so from the police department’s perspective, having another tool in the tool belt to try to keep problem people out of the area while they work on changing their behavior is beneficial.”

The council action expands a 1990s city program that attempted to “map out” sex workers and their clients from certain areas of the city that were identified as hot spots for prostitution. The mapping program now includes an additional 17 crimes unrelated to prostitution — including assault and battery, drug offenses, criminal trespass, disorderly conduct and loitering.

The change does not appear to be tied to any uptick in Old Town crime. It is aimed at providing more flexibility to city prosecutors and additional enforcement options for police, city officials said.

Sharon Dickgrafe, chief deputy city attorney, said the main reason for the change to the ordinance is to allow the city to ban people from going to Old Town as part of a diversion agreement, which allows an offender to keep the violation off their criminal record. The existing ordinance did not allow that as part of a diversion agreement.

“We don’t file a lot of violations of the mapping restrictions, and that could be that they’re either successful or they’re just not going back to those areas for that period of time,” Dickgrafe said. “It became an issue when we were wanting to have these restrictions on people who were on a diversion agreement for a period of agreement and the court did not feel comfortable ordering those because the ordinance talked about ‘condition of probation or conviction.’ So we just wanted to include language to allow that as a sentencing tool and a tool for our office to use regarding diversion conditions.”

Council members voted unanimously to approve the changes after the police department and law department assured them that it would only be enforced on people causing problems while helping police fight crime and improve the perception of Old Town and downtown Wichita.

“(The police department) is only going to have contact with people, quite candidly, if there’s a problem,” Dickgrafe said. “So if (you’re) passing through Old Town, we’re never going to stop you. If you’re at a farmer’s market and you are mapped out, that could be a violation but if you ask the court for exceptions, the court would then determine whether or not an exception was appropriate.”

“So this is less about enforcement and more about helping in prosecution in the future?” council member Dalton Glasscock said.

“Yes,” Dickgrafe said. “It’s just really to give our office another tool and the police department another tool should these people come back into an area that they shouldn’t be for that limited period of time.”

A municipal court judge could carve out exceptions for traveling to work or visiting the farmer’s market, Dickgrafe said.

“You can ask for exceptions,” Dickgrafe said. “If you work in the area, frankly, the exceptions that we get asked for, for work in the area, they were using work vehicles when they were committing the crime, so those were not granted.”

The ban would be in place for the duration of an offender’s probation or diversion agreement, which Dickgrafe said is usually around one year. It could also authorize a municipal judge to order an offender who lives in the Old Town area to relocate.

“It would be up to the court as to whether or not it was appropriate to continue to reside in Old Town for that year period of time,” Dickgrafe said. “I have never seen it applied to someone who lived in Old Town and required them to move.”

This story was originally published September 9, 2025 at 1:49 PM.