Peaceful Parking Lot Percussionists Pounce On Police Peeper
by Robert Norse
Thursday Jan 31st, 2008 3:55 PM
The readiness of the community, the courage of the drummers, and the caution of the police returned every Wednesday tranquility to the Drummer's circle yesterday. Farmer's Market Drum Report Back by Rico gives a succinct statement in a story below. Police Surveillance at the Farmers Market Drum Circle by Nick nicely spotlights Officer Auldridge's Constitution-Shredding -As-Usual.
Drummers Back Sound in the Beat in Lot #4
In a low-key but triumphant resumption of the weekly Drum Circle next to the Farmer's Market, tomtom regulars returned to their spot under the towering Magnolia trees in parking lot #4. Nervously on the lookout for cops with pocket watches doing the Fifteen-Minutes-and-Get-Out Hippiewatch, the drum crowd was considerably smaller than the week before. Last week, the few survivors of earlier police assembly-wrecking expeditions had clumped together on the sidewalk, avoiding the parking lot. Yesterday, folks came directly to the traditional gathering place in the center of the lot, apparently willing to risk citations and determined to resist intimidation.
Food Not Bombs' colorful bike trailer showed up around 3:15 PM with buckets of veggies and boxes of bread. The hot food went fast. The dwindling supplies were reinforced forty-five minutes later with Jumbogumbo Joe Schultz's Vegan Surprise—a hot orientalism brew—which lasted until dark.
Stepping out of a time machine, libertarian community activist Jhond Golder strode the lot, sporting a tri-cornered “patriot” hat and a large white “Don't Tread On Me” flag on a 12' pole. “Bathrobespierre” Robert Norse (that's me, the writer) parked his bumper-sticken strewn car in the lot itself, and affixed a “Copwatch” sign to his rear window. I then set up several dated, but informative, displays documenting ACLU and National Law Center on Homelessness and Poverty opposition to the Parking Garage Paranoia Law (the daddy of the current Parking Lot Panic law).
The ancient “46 Strikes Against the Parking Garage Paranoia Law” was displayed for the curious. It and other documents can be found in the early discussion of the law at http://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2006/04/25/18177761.php
http://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2006/03/19/18090531.php,
and http://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2006/04/09/18140881.php .
At one point a motorcycle cop drove through the parking lot but otherwise police were nowhere to be seen. There was no sign of the eager and dutiful Officer Auldridge, who had cheerfully wasted chunks of city time and money driving away drummers on January 16th with warnings (see http://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2008/01/16/18472946.php.)
The mystery was solved when a passing student, emerged from the nearby UCSC to reveal that the unstoppable Auldridge hunched on the stairway between the first and second floors indoors, videoing the criminals drumming, dancing, sharing food, and chatting in the parking lot below. Another example of political surveillance at its best? Of course, the city attorney could evenly and fairly charge every single person and spectator in the parking lot not retrieving or parking a car with an infraction—or they could destroy the film. Let's see what they do.
In response to this police behavior chilling the protest, flagwaver Golder moved his “Don't Tread on Me” flat adjacent to Auldridge's window peephole. I came closer with camcorder to catch some of Auldridge's thoughts and show the community their police department in action. But—perhaps understandably—the officer didn't want to be outed as a political snoop as I raised my voice to draw the attention of Farmers Market customers to the “new” Santa Cruz.
Otherwise things proceeded calmly and happily—as did on Wednesday afternoons before Coonerty's Parking Lot Panic Law was passed. A lone poi juggler danced and twirled. Hungry locals shared food and company around the Food Not Bombs buckets. A disgruntled local circled me on a bike shouting “asshole—you're an instigator!”.
I fumbled with the new HUFF camcorder, trying to capture dogs, kids, cops, customers, and passing cars in my viewfinder. I found it hard to do steady shots of the cardboard display devices with enlarged fliers documenting the checkered history of the Parking Lot—hopefully next time my expertise and equipment will improve.
On the sidewalk nearby Trash Orchestra regulars had traded in their homemade percussion bangbangs for juggling pins and were practicing on the sidewalk.
I'll be playing some audio tape this evening 6-8 PM on Free Radio Santa Cruz 101.1 FM, http://www.freakradio.org. It'll be archived by tomorrow hopefully at http://www.radiolibre.org/brb/brb080131.mp3
Meanwhile the police will be trolling the parking lots, looking for folks sitting in their cars, homeless people ducking out of the rain, or just anyone who makes them feel uncomfortable. And the power of 100 officers and a like number of city employees and merchants playing snitch will be doing their bit to quietly make public spaces inhospitable to those not marching to and from their vehicles.
We won this time. But we need to keep our eyes open round the clock. Every time a police officer or wannabe harasses someone in a parking lot, inform the officer that you'll be contacting the SCPD when you see a tourist lingering in a lot so that they can show how fair they are by doing the same to her or him. I know this idea offends everyone (including my fellow activists), but the law is a far deeper offense and it will be implemented round the clock throughout the week unless the community fights back.
As one Berkeley activist chalked on the sidewalk during the (successful) People's Park struggle of 1991 “A police state costs more than a welfare state—we guarantee it!”
Video Part I
Video Part Two
Friday, February 1, 2008
Saturday, January 26, 2008
Taking Back the Tarmac--Santa Cruz Reclaims People's Parking Lot #4
Taking Back the Tarmac--Santa Cruz Reclaims People's Parking Lot #4
Police disrupted and dispersed lawful public assemblies of drummers on December 26th, January 2nd, and January 16th. But this time the Community with the help of the Trash Orchestra and Food Not Bombs repeated their victory of January 9th holding the bumbusting Blueshifts at Bay. They were ably assisted by "Jumbogumbo" Joe Schultz's vegan victuals and renewed community outrage against keystone Cop capers cracking down on an accepted weekly tradition--the Farmer's Market Drum Circle!
The community won a victory today in Parking Lot #4, the lot behind Tacqueria Vallarta on Cathcart between Cedar and Pacific. There under the two tall trees the weekly Drum Circle bounced back from last week's police intimidation. Last week cops with ticketbooks dispersed the drummers, Food Not Bombs, and anyone loafing, loitering, or lingering with warnings of $100+ fines.
Today the crowd nervously returned, lured by food. It grew as the Trash Orchestra began to play. Drummers afraid perhaps of losing their instruments slowly joined in. The trumpeteer returned. Even spectateurs began violating the law by standing on the parking lot without visibly "retrieving or parking" a car or bike--to watch a violent police incident arresting a homeless woman. Even after sunset, the triumphant drumming continued and the crowd danced, children cavorted, and Santa Cruz took a deep breath of air from an earlier sweeter era. Police, except for the one incident involving Officer Kline, stayed away, presumably daunted by the potential prospect of giving out dozens of tickets and having to confront some who were willing to "risk arrest".
The City has a new ban on assembling or even lingering in a public parking lot or garage (unless for the express purpose of parking or retrieving a car or bicycle, and then only for 15 minutes). [http://www.ci.santa-cruz.ca.us/council/ordinance/2007/17.pdf ] It covers all 20 downtown parking lots as well as all 4 garages, and any new public lots that might be added in the downtown as well as in adjacent districts.
The Drum Circle has met for years, next to the Farmer's Market usually accompanied by Food Not Bombs around 3:30 or 4 PM. It's marked by dancing, juggling, hackeysacking, hugging, chatting, and other activities now forbidden in parking lots and garages all over the downtown in the name of “public safety”.
This afternoon, however, around 3 PM no one sat under the two large trees. Off to the side with their feet on the sidewalk, a thin line of regulars, many of them drummers without their instruments, sat looking downhearted and resentful. Some talked about the dozen tickets that were issued the night before in the rain as police harassed, ticketed, and then reticketed them for “sleeping”. Two confirmed that a police officer had told them the Drum Circle was "dead"; that there would be no more drumming in lot #4.
The week before on January 16th Sgt. Flippo, Officer Auldridge, and three other officers had bullied several dozen drummers away from the area with threats of tickets under the new Parking Lots and Garages Trespass law (I call it the Parking Lot Panic Law) The “warnings” “persuaded” the drummers to abandon their drum circle and move over to Pacific Ave. where a smaller group continued drumming.
This week, Suzanne, a lead drummer vowed, they would take citations if necessary—and then if threatened with arrest, move over to Pacific Avenue. I felt a twinge of frustration, since I thought it would really take the absurd and chilling spectacle of repeated arrests. How else could we generate the publicity necessary to beat back the latest repressive moves of Mayor Ryan Coonerty and City Manager Dick Wilson's anti-homeless, anti-hippie Parking Lot Panic law? The absurdly expanded police power was not something middle-class people would even notice, if selectively enforced.
Even worse, if people decided to restrict their own rights and give up these traditional spaces, (“everyone their own cop!”), this constitutional coup would work like a charm. Ten square blocks of precious public space in the city-owned lots and garages would evaporate as areas of public use. Anyone lingering in a lot could be detained on “reasonable suspicion”, ID-checked, and questioned. Another “useful tool” for the police department as SCPD spinmeister Zack Friend might put it. People would quickly forget what rights they used to have and follow the newest orders from SCPD Police Chief Howard Skerry's Downtown Dicks.
As happened two weeks before, the arrival and involvement of the Trash Orchestra and the presence of video and audio cameras recording seemed to stiffen the resolve of folks there. The actual reoccupation of the drum circle space under the trees was prompted by the arrival of a truck carrying hot vegan soup and (!) slices of tritip steak from master chef and caterer India Joe Schultz.
There was no mainstream media on the scene; Good Times apparently did have a reporter there. I heard afterwards that City on a Hill sent a reporter, though s/he never spoke to me. Indymedia's experienced photographer Bradley was snapping pictures. And I was fumbling with a camcorder in my maiden voyage (hopefully to be posted tomorrow).
Though police were reportedly grouped, if not massed, over by the Metro, only one squad car braved the Drum Circle reinforced by the Trash Orchestra. Officer Kline and a female officer took down “Crazy Mary”, a homeless local who has been documenting ranger misconduct in the Pogonip, police harassment around McDonalds on Ocean St. anti-homeless policies at Finn's Cafe also at Ocean. Officer Kline apparently also collided with the bike cart of another homeless man—Jack. Angry drummers and locals shouting “let her go” surrounded Kline's squad car. Though asked repeatedly what the charges against Mary were, Kline reportedly declined to say (even though Mary was one of the people asking).
He and other police officers, according to Angela, a witness to what she termed a police “hit-and-run”, then refused to take a police report of a hit-and-run, but only agreed to take Jack's “claim”. Angela may be reporting on this story independently.
The final score: Police trash a bike cart, arrest one homeless woman, and make one squadcar sweep through the parking lot. Drummers, soup servers, dancers, and community onlookers retook the parking lot without the hassle of further warnings, overt surveillance, and/or citations. And no rain--in spite of repeated predictions!
Good work, Santa Cruz.
But can so much energy be mustered even once a week? And what about the rest of the time when police have free license to hassle?
It's time to consider other avenues like a systematic campaign of ticketing tourists, demanding police warn and cite up-scale tourists in the lots and garages, and even taking such folks into custody ourselves and presenting them to the police to "sign their citations." Once the Downtown Association and Chamber of Commerce start receiving complaints about this absurd law actually being equally enforced, it will be sent back to the shop for major repairs.
Perhaps a loiter-in in front of the Downtown Association or Coonerty's Bookshop Santa Cruz to identify the heart of the cancer that is pushing these repressive laws?
One parking lot back in the people's hands--at least one afternoon a week. Only 19 more to go! Check out the location of the forbidden lots and garages at http://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2007/09/21/18448912.php .
Two tips of the hat to the Tough-toned Trash Orchestra which not only led the Take-Back today, but also rehearsed without crowd backup on the 3rd floor of the River St. parking garage for 2 hours in violation of Coonerty's "roust the riffraff" law.
Today the crowd nervously returned, lured by food. It grew as the Trash Orchestra began to play. Drummers afraid perhaps of losing their instruments slowly joined in. The trumpeteer returned. Even spectateurs began violating the law by standing on the parking lot without visibly "retrieving or parking" a car or bike--to watch a violent police incident arresting a homeless woman. Even after sunset, the triumphant drumming continued and the crowd danced, children cavorted, and Santa Cruz took a deep breath of air from an earlier sweeter era. Police, except for the one incident involving Officer Kline, stayed away, presumably daunted by the potential prospect of giving out dozens of tickets and having to confront some who were willing to "risk arrest".
The City has a new ban on assembling or even lingering in a public parking lot or garage (unless for the express purpose of parking or retrieving a car or bicycle, and then only for 15 minutes). [http://www.ci.santa-cruz.ca.us/council/ordinance/2007/17.pdf ] It covers all 20 downtown parking lots as well as all 4 garages, and any new public lots that might be added in the downtown as well as in adjacent districts.
The Drum Circle has met for years, next to the Farmer's Market usually accompanied by Food Not Bombs around 3:30 or 4 PM. It's marked by dancing, juggling, hackeysacking, hugging, chatting, and other activities now forbidden in parking lots and garages all over the downtown in the name of “public safety”.
This afternoon, however, around 3 PM no one sat under the two large trees. Off to the side with their feet on the sidewalk, a thin line of regulars, many of them drummers without their instruments, sat looking downhearted and resentful. Some talked about the dozen tickets that were issued the night before in the rain as police harassed, ticketed, and then reticketed them for “sleeping”. Two confirmed that a police officer had told them the Drum Circle was "dead"; that there would be no more drumming in lot #4.
The week before on January 16th Sgt. Flippo, Officer Auldridge, and three other officers had bullied several dozen drummers away from the area with threats of tickets under the new Parking Lots and Garages Trespass law (I call it the Parking Lot Panic Law) The “warnings” “persuaded” the drummers to abandon their drum circle and move over to Pacific Ave. where a smaller group continued drumming.This week, Suzanne, a lead drummer vowed, they would take citations if necessary—and then if threatened with arrest, move over to Pacific Avenue. I felt a twinge of frustration, since I thought it would really take the absurd and chilling spectacle of repeated arrests. How else could we generate the publicity necessary to beat back the latest repressive moves of Mayor Ryan Coonerty and City Manager Dick Wilson's anti-homeless, anti-hippie Parking Lot Panic law? The absurdly expanded police power was not something middle-class people would even notice, if selectively enforced.
Even worse, if people decided to restrict their own rights and give up these traditional spaces, (“everyone their own cop!”), this constitutional coup would work like a charm. Ten square blocks of precious public space in the city-owned lots and garages would evaporate as areas of public use. Anyone lingering in a lot could be detained on “reasonable suspicion”, ID-checked, and questioned. Another “useful tool” for the police department as SCPD spinmeister Zack Friend might put it. People would quickly forget what rights they used to have and follow the newest orders from SCPD Police Chief Howard Skerry's Downtown Dicks.
As happened two weeks before, the arrival and involvement of the Trash Orchestra and the presence of video and audio cameras recording seemed to stiffen the resolve of folks there. The actual reoccupation of the drum circle space under the trees was prompted by the arrival of a truck carrying hot vegan soup and (!) slices of tritip steak from master chef and caterer India Joe Schultz.
There was no mainstream media on the scene; Good Times apparently did have a reporter there. I heard afterwards that City on a Hill sent a reporter, though s/he never spoke to me. Indymedia's experienced photographer Bradley was snapping pictures. And I was fumbling with a camcorder in my maiden voyage (hopefully to be posted tomorrow).
Though police were reportedly grouped, if not massed, over by the Metro, only one squad car braved the Drum Circle reinforced by the Trash Orchestra. Officer Kline and a female officer took down “Crazy Mary”, a homeless local who has been documenting ranger misconduct in the Pogonip, police harassment around McDonalds on Ocean St. anti-homeless policies at Finn's Cafe also at Ocean. Officer Kline apparently also collided with the bike cart of another homeless man—Jack. Angry drummers and locals shouting “let her go” surrounded Kline's squad car. Though asked repeatedly what the charges against Mary were, Kline reportedly declined to say (even though Mary was one of the people asking).
He and other police officers, according to Angela, a witness to what she termed a police “hit-and-run”, then refused to take a police report of a hit-and-run, but only agreed to take Jack's “claim”. Angela may be reporting on this story independently.
The final score: Police trash a bike cart, arrest one homeless woman, and make one squadcar sweep through the parking lot. Drummers, soup servers, dancers, and community onlookers retook the parking lot without the hassle of further warnings, overt surveillance, and/or citations. And no rain--in spite of repeated predictions!
Good work, Santa Cruz.
But can so much energy be mustered even once a week? And what about the rest of the time when police have free license to hassle?
It's time to consider other avenues like a systematic campaign of ticketing tourists, demanding police warn and cite up-scale tourists in the lots and garages, and even taking such folks into custody ourselves and presenting them to the police to "sign their citations." Once the Downtown Association and Chamber of Commerce start receiving complaints about this absurd law actually being equally enforced, it will be sent back to the shop for major repairs.
Perhaps a loiter-in in front of the Downtown Association or Coonerty's Bookshop Santa Cruz to identify the heart of the cancer that is pushing these repressive laws?
One parking lot back in the people's hands--at least one afternoon a week. Only 19 more to go! Check out the location of the forbidden lots and garages at http://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2007/09/21/18448912.php .
Two tips of the hat to the Tough-toned Trash Orchestra which not only led the Take-Back today, but also rehearsed without crowd backup on the 3rd floor of the River St. parking garage for 2 hours in violation of Coonerty's "roust the riffraff" law.
Lawsuit interview with David Beauvais
Civil rights attorney David Beauvais down in Santa Cruz rounding up plaintiffs for a lawsuit against the City and city police, talks about Santa Cruz's harsh and unique "Sleeping Ban" law. MC 6.36.010 makes the act of falling asleep on all public property and much private property a $97 crime for 1300-1500 shelterless people each night.
Thursday, December 27, 2007
Santa Cruz Sleeping Ban Struggle
Santa Cruz Sleeping Ban Struggle (for Street Spirit newspaper)
The Santa Cruz Sleeping Ban is a local law that defines sleeping at night as “camping” and prescribes a $97 fine for falling asleep outside a house or hotel within City limits. Using one’s vehicle as housing is illegal, even though the city provides no alternatives. The County has been out of compliance with its affordable housing element for decades. Since there’s shelter space in winter for only 160 of the city’s 1500-2000 homeless residents, the law in effect makes it a crime to be homeless at night, unless you stay awake.
The continued flow of money and consumerism has become more important then human life or the basic rights we are all supposed to equally share in, or so it seems from the perspective of those that run our city. Every time we allow a right to be taken away from any class of people we are destroying our own rights. By allowing the government to make and keep such laws we only open the door for more.
Criminalizing the act of sleeping or any necessity would seem a joke. People have to sleep and will regardless of what law are in place. The problem is telling someone they cannot sleep because they are poor or because they have no house is paramount to having “Black Only” drinking fountains. Sleeping allowed for those with homes; sleeping banned for those without.
Recently in Santa Cruz the Sleeping Ban debate has become heated. After a week-long protest camp out in August, where Homies for the Homeless created a safe zone for 30-40 homeless people at City Hall [see September Street Spirit], the Santa Cruz Police Department and the local newspaper, the Sentinel vilified the protesters--though the only tickets issued were for sleeping.
In subsequent stories--the Sentinel highlighted graffitists who painted “Fuck the Sleeping Ban” on City Hall. In their on-line forum, the bigots that rule over the Sentinel forums offered up solutions from lining up the homeless to be shot, pesticiding them, and returning to the “troll busting 80’s”. As Bob Patton of the Human Rights Organization wrote in response, “The South will not rise again.”
Protesters have continued Sunday afternoon tabling at the Bookshop Santa Cruz--owned by the Coonerty family where Ryan Coonerty is chief worker. The Coonerty’s do by far have the most power over the shaping of downtown the than any other merchant in a long time.
Chanting and singing homeless Xmas carols, the protesters sport “Banned at the Bookshop” stickers (in response to letters from Coonerty banning them from the bookstore for their “cowardly” protest". They’ve also taken polls on the prevalence of police profiling the poor, urged a boycott of the bookshop, and encouraged homeless people to become plaintiffs in a new lawsuit against the Sleeping ban.
Ryan Coonerty, who is becoming Mayor as I write this, has recently participated in a debate over the Sleeping Ban on Community TV Voices from the Village LIVE. You can watch the debate on-line at
http://www.indybay.org/ or at
http://humanityforhomeless.blogspot.com
HUFF (Homeless United for Friendship & Freedom) activist Robert Norse was not allowed in the debate, despite his knowledge of the laws, and endless years battling City Council and protesting the Sleeping Ban and other laws that are aimed at the poor. The City would be wise to embrace these people for their knowledge alone. This was evident during the debate.
Coonerty refused to debate if Norse was part of the panel. Norse explained subsequently that he hid behind a curtain (“to avoid scaring Ryan away”). When the host called for audience questions, Norse emerged to challenge Coonerty to allow safe sleeping zones and the right to sleep not anywhere-and-everywhere, but somewhere.
Vice mayor Coonerty came across as a representative of business. His lack of knowledge concerning the ordinance, fines, available shelter and financing astounds me. He states they do not take State and Federal funds. This is untrue. The Walk in Shelter is not permitted to allow Medicinal Marijuana patients because of the federal money they receive. Craig Canada is banned from the shelter for just this reason [see Street Spirit August 2007]
Coonerty did not even know the cost of a Sleeping Ban ticket quoting 60.00 dollars when in reality it is $97.00 dollars. Regardless the reason for his ignorance, it shows a tremendous lack of concern for the impoverished in Santa Cruz. This also became evident at a subsequent Sustainable Living Community TV discussion, where his stances on the issues were said to be a "path to a City that caterers only to the elite" by some in the panel.
Throughout the years the City Council has ignored public commentary regarding this subject and continued passing laws aimed at the homeless. Recently the Council passed a law championed by Coonerty banning the public from public parking lots except to park a vehicle or walk directly through; the target: homeless people and “undesirables”. Santa Cruz’s Food Not Bombs will not be able to legally serve food in the parking lot where it has done so for the last decade.
For years 4 SAFE (Society for Artistic Freedom and Expression/ Street performers Against Foolish Enforcement) has held weekly musical munch-in’s on the sidewalk on Santa Cruz’ downtown Pacific Avenue. Last week SCPD moved to use noise ordinances to order people along.
Santa Cruz is now among the top 15 Cities with the worst laws in the country penalizing poverty according to the National Coalition to end Homelessness. Sleep-crime ticketing is up 50% from last year. In the nearby wilderness areas, City Ranger John Wallace’s beefed-up forces harass and cite campers and regularly destroy the property of homeless people in violation of the 4th Amendment (and the Federal Court’s recent Kincaid decision in Fresno).
Downtown authorities resort to primitive social engineering “solutions” like removing benches where poor and street people gather from the main street, putting in change-making machines (which create a 100’ no sitting/no panhandling zone around them), and increasing the terror component of police actions (four police officers surrounded a cowering homeless man in front of the outdoor restaurant Kianti’s recently, for sitting off to the side on the sidewalk.
A deepening pattern of anti-homeless police behavior is emerging. Craig Canada, recently assaulted by a Pizza My Heart patron after Canada bought a slice of pizza and tried to use the bathroom, found himself taken to jail and charged with battery. Donna Deiss, of the vehicle dwellers group, LIVE (Living in Vehicles Excellently) is facing citations for refusing to move her vehicle from a beach side parking lot, restricted to eliminate homeless RVs. Shane Maxfield, Deiss’s former partner is an AIDS-disabled man, who faced a court trial for sitting with his bunny Fluffy on the sidewalk in front of the Pacific Cookie Company.
Sleep--as any fool knows--is a human necessity--hence a human right. SCMC 6.36.010b, known as the "blanket ban", makes it illegal to set-up any bedding, even just having a blanket covering you on a park bench, between the same hours, 11 p.m. and 8:30 a.m.
In Los Angeles, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) took on the Jones case which ended recently in a settlement. The Jones settlement was controversial in some quarters since it was reportedly done without the permission of the plaintiffs or input from homeless advocacy groups. The Jones settlement enjoined police from arresting homeless people from sleeping on the sidewalk from 9 PM to 6 AM, provided sleepers were 10’ away from businesses and until the City built 1250 units of supportive housing.
In Santa Cruz, the local ACLU sat on its hands for decades when approached about Sleeping Ban human rights violations. Even after the Jones precedent from the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals came down in April 2006, the Santa Cruz ACLU expressed no interest in either initiating a lawsuit or supporting one being prepared by local activists.
When Norse and Bernard Klitzner of the Human Rights Organization came to a public meeting of the ACLU with a sign urging the ACLU to end the Sleeping Ban, Board of Directors member Mike Rotkin called the police to have them banned. Ironically, the police declined to do so, even though Rotkin was also a former mayor and sitting Council member (and an avid supporter of the Sleeping Ban). Coonerty himself claims to be a “constitutional lawyer” who teaches classes at nearby colleges. For details of the ACLU fiasco see http://www.indybay.org/
Activists are pressing on with a lawsuit to ban police ticketing of the homeless for the “crime” of sleeping. They face new hurdles. The Jones Decision’ which found it Cruel and unusual punishment to cite someone for sleeping if adequate shelter was not available, can no longer be cited as precedent, due to the precipitous ACLU settlement there mentioned above which vacated and de-published the decision.
Despite this, San Diego has ordered police to stop busting the homeless for sleeping at night; Richmond changed its law to stop ticketing if there is no shelter space; Fresno, under pressure from activists and attorneys, faces a full-scale class-action trial next summer for destroying homeless property. Sacramento has begun its own lawsuit against its Sleeping Ban. Santa Cruz human rights supporters have plenty of company.
The continued flow of money and consumerism has become more important then human life or the basic rights we are all supposed to equally share in, or so it seems from the perspective of those that run our city. Every time we allow a right to be taken away from any class of people we are destroying our own rights. By allowing the government to make and keep such laws we only open the door for more.
Criminalizing the act of sleeping or any necessity would seem a joke. People have to sleep and will regardless of what law are in place. The problem is telling someone they cannot sleep because they are poor or because they have no house is paramount to having “Black Only” drinking fountains. Sleeping allowed for those with homes; sleeping banned for those without.
Recently in Santa Cruz the Sleeping Ban debate has become heated. After a week-long protest camp out in August, where Homies for the Homeless created a safe zone for 30-40 homeless people at City Hall [see September Street Spirit], the Santa Cruz Police Department and the local newspaper, the Sentinel vilified the protesters--though the only tickets issued were for sleeping.In subsequent stories--the Sentinel highlighted graffitists who painted “Fuck the Sleeping Ban” on City Hall. In their on-line forum, the bigots that rule over the Sentinel forums offered up solutions from lining up the homeless to be shot, pesticiding them, and returning to the “troll busting 80’s”. As Bob Patton of the Human Rights Organization wrote in response, “The South will not rise again.”
Protesters have continued Sunday afternoon tabling at the Bookshop Santa Cruz--owned by the Coonerty family where Ryan Coonerty is chief worker. The Coonerty’s do by far have the most power over the shaping of downtown the than any other merchant in a long time.
Chanting and singing homeless Xmas carols, the protesters sport “Banned at the Bookshop” stickers (in response to letters from Coonerty banning them from the bookstore for their “cowardly” protest". They’ve also taken polls on the prevalence of police profiling the poor, urged a boycott of the bookshop, and encouraged homeless people to become plaintiffs in a new lawsuit against the Sleeping ban.
Ryan Coonerty, who is becoming Mayor as I write this, has recently participated in a debate over the Sleeping Ban on Community TV Voices from the Village LIVE. You can watch the debate on-line at
http://www.indybay.org/ or at
http://humanityforhomeless.blogspot.com
HUFF (Homeless United for Friendship & Freedom) activist Robert Norse was not allowed in the debate, despite his knowledge of the laws, and endless years battling City Council and protesting the Sleeping Ban and other laws that are aimed at the poor. The City would be wise to embrace these people for their knowledge alone. This was evident during the debate.
Coonerty refused to debate if Norse was part of the panel. Norse explained subsequently that he hid behind a curtain (“to avoid scaring Ryan away”). When the host called for audience questions, Norse emerged to challenge Coonerty to allow safe sleeping zones and the right to sleep not anywhere-and-everywhere, but somewhere.
Vice mayor Coonerty came across as a representative of business. His lack of knowledge concerning the ordinance, fines, available shelter and financing astounds me. He states they do not take State and Federal funds. This is untrue. The Walk in Shelter is not permitted to allow Medicinal Marijuana patients because of the federal money they receive. Craig Canada is banned from the shelter for just this reason [see Street Spirit August 2007]Coonerty did not even know the cost of a Sleeping Ban ticket quoting 60.00 dollars when in reality it is $97.00 dollars. Regardless the reason for his ignorance, it shows a tremendous lack of concern for the impoverished in Santa Cruz. This also became evident at a subsequent Sustainable Living Community TV discussion, where his stances on the issues were said to be a "path to a City that caterers only to the elite" by some in the panel.
Throughout the years the City Council has ignored public commentary regarding this subject and continued passing laws aimed at the homeless. Recently the Council passed a law championed by Coonerty banning the public from public parking lots except to park a vehicle or walk directly through; the target: homeless people and “undesirables”. Santa Cruz’s Food Not Bombs will not be able to legally serve food in the parking lot where it has done so for the last decade.
For years 4 SAFE (Society for Artistic Freedom and Expression/ Street performers Against Foolish Enforcement) has held weekly musical munch-in’s on the sidewalk on Santa Cruz’ downtown Pacific Avenue. Last week SCPD moved to use noise ordinances to order people along.Santa Cruz is now among the top 15 Cities with the worst laws in the country penalizing poverty according to the National Coalition to end Homelessness. Sleep-crime ticketing is up 50% from last year. In the nearby wilderness areas, City Ranger John Wallace’s beefed-up forces harass and cite campers and regularly destroy the property of homeless people in violation of the 4th Amendment (and the Federal Court’s recent Kincaid decision in Fresno).
Downtown authorities resort to primitive social engineering “solutions” like removing benches where poor and street people gather from the main street, putting in change-making machines (which create a 100’ no sitting/no panhandling zone around them), and increasing the terror component of police actions (four police officers surrounded a cowering homeless man in front of the outdoor restaurant Kianti’s recently, for sitting off to the side on the sidewalk.
A deepening pattern of anti-homeless police behavior is emerging. Craig Canada, recently assaulted by a Pizza My Heart patron after Canada bought a slice of pizza and tried to use the bathroom, found himself taken to jail and charged with battery. Donna Deiss, of the vehicle dwellers group, LIVE (Living in Vehicles Excellently) is facing citations for refusing to move her vehicle from a beach side parking lot, restricted to eliminate homeless RVs. Shane Maxfield, Deiss’s former partner is an AIDS-disabled man, who faced a court trial for sitting with his bunny Fluffy on the sidewalk in front of the Pacific Cookie Company.
Sleep--as any fool knows--is a human necessity--hence a human right. SCMC 6.36.010b, known as the "blanket ban", makes it illegal to set-up any bedding, even just having a blanket covering you on a park bench, between the same hours, 11 p.m. and 8:30 a.m.
In Los Angeles, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) took on the Jones case which ended recently in a settlement. The Jones settlement was controversial in some quarters since it was reportedly done without the permission of the plaintiffs or input from homeless advocacy groups. The Jones settlement enjoined police from arresting homeless people from sleeping on the sidewalk from 9 PM to 6 AM, provided sleepers were 10’ away from businesses and until the City built 1250 units of supportive housing.
In Santa Cruz, the local ACLU sat on its hands for decades when approached about Sleeping Ban human rights violations. Even after the Jones precedent from the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals came down in April 2006, the Santa Cruz ACLU expressed no interest in either initiating a lawsuit or supporting one being prepared by local activists.
When Norse and Bernard Klitzner of the Human Rights Organization came to a public meeting of the ACLU with a sign urging the ACLU to end the Sleeping Ban, Board of Directors member Mike Rotkin called the police to have them banned. Ironically, the police declined to do so, even though Rotkin was also a former mayor and sitting Council member (and an avid supporter of the Sleeping Ban). Coonerty himself claims to be a “constitutional lawyer” who teaches classes at nearby colleges. For details of the ACLU fiasco see http://www.indybay.org/
Activists are pressing on with a lawsuit to ban police ticketing of the homeless for the “crime” of sleeping. They face new hurdles. The Jones Decision’ which found it Cruel and unusual punishment to cite someone for sleeping if adequate shelter was not available, can no longer be cited as precedent, due to the precipitous ACLU settlement there mentioned above which vacated and de-published the decision.
Despite this, San Diego has ordered police to stop busting the homeless for sleeping at night; Richmond changed its law to stop ticketing if there is no shelter space; Fresno, under pressure from activists and attorneys, faces a full-scale class-action trial next summer for destroying homeless property. Sacramento has begun its own lawsuit against its Sleeping Ban. Santa Cruz human rights supporters have plenty of company.
Wednesday, November 21, 2007
Sleeping Ban Debate on Voices from the Village
Part I
Part II
Part III
Part IIII
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