Mayor Sam Adams and City Commissioner Amanda Fritz called a meeting on Tuesday, September 1, to talk about a “sidewalk
management initiative” that they hope to introduce soon to
replace the unconstitutional sit-lie law.
Only homeless advocates were invited to the meeting, from agencies
like Sisters of the Road, Street Roots, and Transition Projects,
Inc. Fritz said others—like the general public—weren’t
invited because she wanted to give the invited people the
opportunity to speak.
The meeting was called with just 24-hours notice, and until the last
moment, there was ambiguity about press access. Adams even suggested
that attendees should be allowed to say things that they wanted kept
“off the record” if the assembled press in the room could accept
those rules—in his words, so that people at the meeting could
“say something without it being printed in the newspaper.” Fortunately
nobody wanted his or her words kept secret, but I’ll be interested to
see whether business advocates feel the same way at their own
upcoming meeting with the mayor. What might they have to hide, I
wonder?
The advocates expressed the same concerns they have been voicing for
years about ordinances that are targeted specifically against homeless
people. If there’s a problem with harassment or drug activity, asked
Brendan Phillips, a community organizer with Sisters of the
Road, why don’t we enforce those laws against people instead of
creating a broad overarching ordinance that simply targets
homeless people?
“The vast majority of the folks out there slinging dope are standing
up,” said Street Roots Director Israel Bayer. “We agree
110 percent that there are X, Y, and Z problems around
drugs—we’re just not sure using sit-lie is the appropriate way to
tackle those problems.”
Adams said he plans to craft a sidewalk management package that takes all the laws about sidewalk obstruction—covering
sidewalk cafés, A-boards, newspaper boxes, and so on, as well as
access and passage issues on the sidewalk—and puts them under one
umbrella of city code. But he also acknowledged that city council is on
the third, “or is it fourth?” iteration of trying to regulate its
sidewalks for these issues, and said he wanted to make sure that the
new ordinance passes constitutional muster as well as being
simple enough for everyone to understand.
Then Fritz said something marvelous: “We get it. We heard.
Sit-lie is gone.” Let’s hope she says the same thing to the
business folks next week.
Commissioner Fritz was referring to her personal dislike of the term “sit-lie-law”. Mayor Adams and Commissioner Fritz were clear they intend to draft a ordinance with a “through way” clearly defined so every one understands the sections of sidewalk that need to be kept obstruction free.
These obstructions may include objects left on the sidewalk by businesses such as sidewalk signs or newspaper boxes.
The enforcement of the ordinance will determine if the law is constitutional.
I got an idea!
We could round up all the “homeless” and dump them off on reservations or we could round them up and tell them we are going to give them a shower and gas them.
Why don’t the cops just go down there and beat them to death.? They seem to be pretty good at that.
Whatever we do decide to do. For god sake, do not talk to them or look them right in the eye. One my try to follow you home or something and, you know, rob you.
We should all be ashamed of ourselves. These people need our support. What kind of society are we that we do not care for our poor, sick and homeless?
America, you are one heartless, greedy, selfish, bastard. I wish you were never born.
It’s easier oppress people when you dehumanize them. If we call them obstructions then we can pretend that they are not human. Obstructions do not have rights, do they?
If anyone wants to check out my song its called
“No Sit-or-Lie”.
http://www.myspace.com/pseudosymmetry
Can I link to my blog? I want stronger language from opposition here. Unconstitutional is only the half of it. “I don’t like the looka-you”, laws should not be tolerated. They should not be part of the dialogue, and they should not even be considered. Open-mindedness be damned, in principle this is draconian.
Calvin Carpenter (Statue Man) pleaded a case in front of the appellate over so-called exclusion-orders, which were deemed by the appellate to be in violation of the 6th as well. I look for the city to seek avenues of redress in this direction, that of giving this equally draconian concept some teeth, and some wheels. Are there steps being taken?
Lastly, it’s clear opposition’s position is one of gratitude at having the so-called sit/lie phase of the discussion concluded, however, there’s no clear position other than that. What are opposition’s next steps going to be?
I believe it’s critical to steer the course here. There are no, “solutions”, available for, “dealing”, with anybody. Let alone the homeless, let alone the drug-trade. The talk of a $46 million project in Old Town is great news, but I don’t think civic responsibility is the core issue here. The way we utilize law-enforcement resources is the core issue.
It’s my opinion that unless you are seeing one of the gagillion laws we have on the books being broken, then maybe mind your own business. Speaking of business, if you don’t like the conditions in which you do business, feel free to exercise some personal freedom of your own, and move your business out of my market. I appreciate the fact that I have a civic responsibility to treat everyone in my community with defacto dignity, and respect. I expect the same of those I call friend, and yes, even the businesses which I patronize.
The PBA may not hire their own Pinkertons. The PBA may not write civic law. The PBA may not sterilize the downtown core of Portland Oregon so best to turn it into a mall, like every other city in Amexica.
Here is a link to my blog. This post contains links to the C. Carpenter case I mentioned, and the appellate’s opinion. http://tinyurl.com/be3cl5 Again, I encourage moderation to yank that link. I’ve no idea what policy is.