Santa Cruz Library Board Votes On Sleeping Ban Tonight

http://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2013/03/04/18733085.php

Sleeping Ban Back For All Santa Cruz Libraries: Decision Tonight in Aptos
by Robert Norse ( rnorse3 [at] hotmail.com )
Monday Mar 4th, 2013 9:33 AM

The Library Joint Powers Authorities Board meets tonight (Monday March 4th) at the Aptos Public Library at 7695 Soquel Drive to give another tool to the Homeless Haters.

Item 8F on the Agenda of the Library Joint Powers Authority Board is a deepening and darkening of the Patron Code of Conduct and Suspension Policy Update to reestablish a clear Sleeping Ban in all public libraries in Santa Cruz and the surrounding county.

MORE TOOLS IN SEARCH OF VICTIMS
The Agenda is posted at http://www.santacruzpl.org/media/pdf/ljpb/20130304_agenda.pdf . The relevant pages are 26-28.

There are no complaints on file as far as I can determine in the current monthly update of problems involving people sleeping in the library (pp. 45-48, 54-55). There are two complaints of people sleeping in the library parking lot (presumably the one in the back of the library) with their stuff “spread out”. It seems unclear why there is a need to make rules harsher in what has been one of the few remaining legal public places for homeless people to be unmolested.

A story on an Iowa library banning sleeping (pp. 49-50) has the usual omission of whether city law bans homeless people sleeping in public places generally–which Santa Cruz law does–and whether it has utterly inadequate shelter space (ditto with Santa Cruz).

Recently Berkeley has adopted a similar NIMBY (Not In My Back Yard) policy regarding bringing property into the library (necessary for homeless people who have no place to store their stuff and need to bring it with them). See http://www.berkeleyside.com/2013/01/02/has-it-gotten-harder-to-be-homeless-in-berkeley/ and the comments that follow.

Currently if someone is blocking the stacks, or snoring, or impeding traffic through being sprawled out, all these issues can be (and presumably have been) addressed without sending around the “sleep police”. There’s currently a burly First Alarm Security guard who has been patrolling the library and surrounding grounds who creates what some regard as an intimidating presence (in all candor, some don’t).

EXTINGUISHING THE LIBRARY AS A SHADOW OF A SANCTUARY
In an unexpected pushback against the county-wide attack on homeless people (ranging from destruction of campsites to crackdowns on Pacific Avenue), the Board voted 5-4 in early December to specifically delete the Sleeping Ban from library policy. With nasty changes in personnel (MacPherson, Friend, Mathews, to name only a few), the blast of bigotry is chilling.

While the language seems genteel (“Refrain from sleeping in the library”), it is backed by a Draconian Policy of Enforcing Suspension.

That policy, made much harsher late last year, specifies that First Violation results in a reading of the rules, 2nd Violation a 1-day suspension, 3rd Violation a 30-day suspension, and 4th Violation up to 6 months. No formal hearing process for anything under 31-days (appeal to the mercy of Teresa Landers, the woman who pushed these policies). Even more telling, in all cases, a person so charged has only 1-day to file a written request for an appeal, or the appeal will not be considered. (See p. 31 E, 7: “To submit a written appeal, the patron must complete the “Appeal of 30-Day Suspension” document. The patron must return the completed form to the suspending library within one working day from the date the suspension is issued.”).

None of the incident reports are actually included in the Agenda. It took me over a month to get past such reports with a Public Records Act request.

There are no exceptions for children falling asleep. The law provides broad opportunity to be selectively enforced–either based on the desires of the staff to be “dutiful”, but also the prejudices of certain library users who want to “clean up” the library.

This looks like a slamdunk for the Bigot Bunch, but e-mail them anyway:

LINE-UP OF PERPETRATORS

Contact the following Board members

Citizen Dick English
117 Union Street
Santa Cruz, CA 95060 Home: 831-539-3299 rpenglish [at] sbcglobal.net

Citizen Martha Dexter
117 Union Street
Santa Cruz, CA 95060 Home: 831-600-8834 mmdexter [at] gmail.com

Citizen Nancy Gerdt
117 Union Street
Santa Cruz, CA 95060 Home: 831-335-3130 ngerdt45 [at] gmail.com

Councilmember Cynthia Mathews
City of Santa Cruz
809 Center Street
Santa Cruz, CA 95060 Office: 831-420-5020
Fax: 831-420-5011 cmathews [at] cityofsantacruz.com

Councilmember David Terrazas Chair
City of Santa Cruz
809 Center Street
Santa Cruz, CA 95060 Office: 831-420-5020
Fax: 831-420-5011 dterrazas [at] cityofsantacruz.com

Councilmember Jim Reed
225 Navigator Drive
Scotts Valley, CA 95066 Home: 831-461-0222 jimreedsv [at] gmail.com

Councilmember Michael Termini
Vice Chair
City of Capitola
420 Capitola Avenue
Capitola, CA 95010 Office: 831-476-6206 michael [at] triadelectric.com

Supervisor Bruce McPherson
County of Santa Cruz
701 Ocean Street, Room 500
Santa Cruz, CA 95060 Office: 831-454-2200
Fax: 831-454-3262 bruce.mcpherson [at] co.santa-cruz.ca.us

Supervisor Zach Friend
701 Ocean Street
Santa Cruz, CA 95060 Office: 831-454-2200
Fax: 831-454-3262 zach.friend [at] co.santa-cruz.ca.us

THE STRUGGLE CONTINUES
More background on this struggle can be found at http://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2012/12/29/18729056.php (“Lost in Lander’s Library Labyrinth…” and http://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2012/11/30/18726836.php (“Library to Consider Restrictive New Policies”).

There will be a meeting noon tomorrow at Laurel Park next to Louden Nelson Center (Tuesday March 5th) to discuss a Sanctuary Campground for the homeless. A second meeting on the subject will take place the next day at the Sub Rosa Cafe (703 Pacific) at noon after the HUFF meeting (10 AM to noon).

Library Coughs Up Complaint Copies–Available at City Hall

Gail  et. al.:  Copies of the library complaints are now available for viewing at the City Council Offices at City Hall–see article below.  Please pass this info on to anyone you think would be interested, and also let me know if you check them out, what your thoughts are.  Thanks for coming to the December and January meetings.  Also, more important, if you hear or see anything in the Main Library, please pass that info along.  Also if anyone develops connections with library staff or a regular homeless library user as a contact, please let me know.  –R

http://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2012/12/29/18729056.php?show_comments=1#18730723

I wrote “Bruce Halloway, a member of the public in the audience at the December meeting, several times addressed the Board. On one occasion he remarked that Landers had refused to provide him with access to the previous meeting’s minutes, instead brushing him off and telling him to write out a Public Records Act request and wait 10 days.”

But I learned from Bruce in a later conversation (mentioned above by Bruce) on my radio show that he had actually been searching for earlier minutes–the minutes to recent meetings are on line. Apologies to Teresa and Bruce for this misunderstanding.

Also I was informed last week that a copy of all the complaints made by and to library staff last year in all branches of the library is now available for viewing at the City Council offices at City Hall at 809 Center St. Just tell them you’re looking for the Library Complaints Public Records Act information which Robert Norse requested.

As I understand it, these complaints will only be viewable for another few weeks before they’re returned to the storage archives and will then require another 10 days or more to secure. If anyone takes the time to go through them, please note your thoughts. I’ve only checked over a fraction of them so far.

Robert

Lost in Landers’ Library Labyrinth: Show Us the Records!
by Robert Norse ( rnorse3 [at] hotmail.com )
Saturday Dec 29th, 2012 3:14 PM

After the Library Board magnified the penalties on such “abuses” as having “unattended property” in the library on December 4th, I put in a Public Records Act request to determine what quantity of complaints provoked the change that increases a one month suspension of “library privileges” to six months. After a month, I’ve still received no answer. For those with extra time on their hands, here’s the progress of that journey:

NO SLEEPING BAN BUT INCREASED PENALTIES GENERALLY
While a strong voice from the community defeated one small part of the heightened penalties in the County’s public library system (the “Sleeping Ban” provision), everything else requested by Teresa Landers, Head Librarian, passed. And the Sleeping Ban is likely to be brought up again at a subsequent meeting now that its chief opponent Katherine Beiers is off the City Council (which appoints two members to the Library Board). David Terrazas, the other Council appointee, seems gung-ho to socially cleanse the library of the blight of visible homeless people there (or insist they store their property in non-existent lockers, have a good night’s sleep at a non-existent safe sleeping spot, and shower at hard-to-find shower services before entering the privileged portals).

At the bottom of every e-mail Teresa Landers’ sends is a boilerplate quote: “The libraries’ most powerful asset is the conversation they provide–between books and readers, between children and parents, between individuals and the collective world…Turns out that libraries have nothing at all to do with silence.” Bella Bathurst, “The Secret Life of Libraries,” The Guardian (U.K.), May 1, 2011.

But did this same Landers spearhead the campaign to increase penalties and tighten rules around service dogs, bad-smelling people, sleeping, and unattended backpacks in the library? We don’t know since she’s refused to reveal the history of her e-mails on the subject (as required by the Public Records Act).

The latest set of procedures, which she twice argued for at the November and December library board meetings expands broad disciplinary/exclusion powers of library staff. Apparently the focus is to exclude “troublesome” homeless people “using” the library with their backpacks, odors, and sleep-deprived (city-created) disability.

But what is the real magnitude of the problem. I could get no answers from her at the Library Board meeting in early December (“I don’t have my records with me”). When I tried to get access to records subsequently, well–read on…

Bruce Halloway, a member of the public in the audience at the December meeting, several times addressed the Board. On one occasion he remarked that Landers had refused to provide him with access to the previous meeting’s minutes, instead brushing him off and telling him to write out a Public Records Act request and wait 10 days.

I expressed concern that Landers had not provided an Agenda packet to the audience, so we could tell what the Board was talking about. Nor had the Agenda provide any clarity about which items were open for public comment and which were not—something apparently the Chair decided arbitrarily. See “Update: Small Victory, Larger Defeat” at http://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2012/11/30/18726836.php?show_comments=1#18727113

SEEKING WISDOM IN OLD RECORDS
To delve deeper into the reasons for the new anti-homeless policy, I sent the following Public Records Act Request on December 4th:

To whom It May Concern:

Please provide access to all  copies of complaints against patrons at all branches of the Public Library system from Jan 1, 2012 through the present as well as any records, e-mails, statements, written, audio, or visual regarding library policies impacting library rules that might result in a warning or suspension of library access.   This would include communications to and from the public, public officials, police, security agencies, and  any other group or person around this issue.

Please also provide access to copies of all agendas and minutes of the Board’s meetings through 2012.

I prefer e-mail access to these records.  In the event this is not possible, I would like to see the records prior to deciding which ones I need to copy.

Please advise  me whether a hard copy of the minutes of the prior meeting and agenda packet was available at each of these  meetings.

Further, please  advise me as to whether action items were listed as such on the agendas.

Finally, please advise me as to whether a public comment was provided for each agenda item (as it was not at the December 3rd meeting, except for the one “staff report” item on the rule changes).

I would suggest you publicly announce all these conditions will be corrected at the next meeting or face a Brown Act complaint.

If you have any questions regarding  this request, feel free to call me.

Thanks in advance for your assistance.
Robert Norse (831-423-4833)

Not having heard from her, on December 12th, I sent this follow-up:

Please acknowledge receipt of the Public Records Act request and advise me of its status. Thanks, R. Norse

RESPONDING TO A NON-RESPONSE
Still not having heard from her, four days beyond the legal deadline she is required to respond by, on December 18th, I sent the following:

Teresa:

You have not responded to my query of December 4th.  That feels rude and unhelpful.  It also throws into question your suggestion to a member of the public prior to the last Library Board meeting that making a Public Records Act request in writing is the proper public mode to secure records you are unwilling to provide informally.  You may recall you refused to provide a copy of the minutes from a previous meeting because of “staff problems” and required him to make a written Public Records Act request.

More important, however, you have also not responded to the Public Records Act request in that e-mail (repeated below for your convenience).  This contravenes state law, requiring a response within 10 days or some explanation of the delay.  For your convenience I have emphasized in bold the specifics requested in the Public Records Act communication of December 4th.

You have also not advised me of the status of the request as requested in the e-mail below of December 12th.  Please do so ASAP.

You also declined to make available the agenda packet of the Board at the last Library Board meeting, nor to assure us that this will be done for all future meetings as a matter of public right under the Brown Act.   Please reassure us on this straightaway.

Moreover the make-up of the agenda seemed to make it unclear which items were actually agenda-ized (and so required the Board to hear public comment) and which weren’t.  Again, I request you clarify that for future meetings this be made obvious to the public, so that the chair is not put in the position of differentially allowing comment on some items, and not on others.

If you decline to provide an answer to the other simple questions put forth in the December 4th e-mail, you require me to  seek further public records which I feel unnecessarily burdens you and your staff, so please avoid this by being direct and concise.

If you are not the appropriate person to address these concerns, please so advise me.  I am also cc-ing the chair of the meeting.  I believe that between the two of you, you share responsibility here.

Thanks, Robert Norse

I included a copy of the original Public Records Act request of December 4th with the first three paragraphs reprinted in bold for emphasis.

TERESA RESPONDS
To this, Teresa responded (on December 18th). She wrote “I provided the information requested that I have available to the City Clerk’s office which processes Public Records Act requests for the Library. That office will be responding to your request if they have not already done so.”

Note she did not answer any of the questions directly whatsoever, information she surely had about providing agendas to the public, etc.

I replied on the same day: Thanks, Teresa. Please send me a copy of your forwarding request–which would include the date forwarded. It’s not clear to me why you didn’t respond directly to me, since you clearly have the information and I’m the one who wants it. Could you clarify?

She declined to send me a copy of her forwarded e-mail to the City Clerk’s office but did right (again on the same day): “The City Clerk’s office has a way to track requests so they handle them for us. Also, some of the information you requested is not in the Library’s possession so the City Clerk;s office handles gathering the information.”

This, of course, ignored any information she might have and sloughed off any personal responsibility which she likely has for creating agendas, making them available, providing her own e-mails on the subject to the Board, etc.

ANGER FROM THE STREETS & THE SLAPDOWN THAT FOLLOWED
Ricardo Lopez, a street musician who can often be found in front of downtown New Leaf on Pacific Avenue, wrote Landers an angry letter about the situation which included some harsh criticism such as

“Come on T.L.. whatta ya thinking? …You’re above the law, because the law is for the people who have so much less wealth than you, right?…you’re… apparently nursing some kind of psychological misanthropy … Quit. Let someone else make the city run right….Just buckle down at Macdonald’s or Taco Bell, or where ever your new job is, and work hard to make Santa Cruz a better place in your own little way, which is much better than your doing now. Right? You can’t or won’t or don’t want to do your job. So it will be easier if you’ll just get out of the way, and let a decent, moral, psychologically stable, and more importantly competent person administer…”

Within a week, Lopez notes, he was accosted in the library by a burly First Alarm security guard under the new “unattended property” (he’d left his backpack at another table while using the library computer, he says). Lopez reports that though he was able to retrieve his backpack, which the guard threatened to “throw outside”, he is now apprehensive about returning to the library.

PERSISTING IN THE PUBLIC RECORDS ACT REQUEST BUT STILL NO CIGAR…
In response to Landers e-mail, I replied: Thanks again, Teresa. I  don’t see a copy of the e-mail forwarded to the City Clerk. Could you please  forward  that to me, please, as requested since this Public Records Act is now overdue. Also  while I  appreciate your forwarding requests about information you do not have to the City Clerk, it would save time (and frustration) for you to forward information you do have to members of the public directly.  Will you be doing this or will you continue to reroute requests through the City Clerk? Thanks, R

The next day city administrator/clerk Bren Lehr cc-ed me that he was directing Nydia Patino to provide some long-awaited answers. I thanked him.

On the same day one of Lehr’s workers sent me an e-mail advising me that Board packets from 1997-2005 were available for review and that more recent ones were on-line at http://www.santacruzpl.org/aboutscpl/govern/ljpb/. She also included the Manual for “Problem Situations” dated 2007 (without the latest harsher measures passed by the Board three weeks before) and some e-mails between Landers and different groups. However there was no specific record of the supposed complaints that prompted the tightened policies.

There were some interesting exchange between Councilmember and Library Board member Terrazas & Landers suggesting that a “Triple Fine Zone” be established at the library, similar to the one to rein in drunken revelers (and collect a bit of cash for the City bureaucrats) on Halloween, the 4th of July, and New Year’s. I’ve yet to parse those but hope to do so soon with an additional report.

STILL LOOKING FOR THE RECORDS–AND ANOTHER DELAY UNTIL AFTER THE HOLIDAYS
So I replied the next day:

Pursuant to California Gov’t Code 6253(a) I ask you to collect the Library’s completed “incident reports” for year 2012 for all branches, so that I may arrange to inspect them at the Santa Cruz Main Library, and choose to have some or all of them copied for me.

Note that although these incidents reports are declared to be confidential and to not be public records, your agency cannot declare records to be exempt from the California Public Records Act (CPRA) by fiat. They are not investigatory records of a security agency. They are not personnel records. I do not believe they are exempted by any California state law from being made available for my inspection. The privacy of third party individuals may be protected by redacting those portions of these records prior to my inspection.

If these records are available electronically, such as in PDF or DOC formats, then I ask that they be made available to me electronically, preferably by email.

Thank you for ensuring the operations of the Santa Cruz library are open and transparent to the public by fulfilling this request without obstruction or unnecessary delay.

And a day later, Landers replied: “The incident reports you have requested are not maintained by the Library. Once we have reviewed them they are filed with the risk management division of the City. That office is closed until January 7, as is the City Clerk’s office.  The City Clerk’s office will arrange for you to review those documents after January 7. They are not available in electronic form.”

That Landers made no mention or itemization of complaints received over the last year in pressing for a new policy or in formulating one in internal memos, seems to me unlikely. It was also her responsibility to have responded to this request by December 14th—which included forwarding it to the Risk Manager. The point being that unless one continues to apply persistent pressure, answers don’t come.

Those who wish to weigh in on this issue can find e-mails for the Library Board (minus Beiers) at http://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2012/11/30/18726836.php .


Comments  (Hide Comments)

by John E. Colby

Saturday Dec 29th, 2012 4:46 PM

It’s a sad day when even the libraries in our city lack openness and transparency. It’s a library FGS. If a library acts like a secret government agency it shows the entire city government has devolved into being completely anti-democratic.

Santa Cruz is a plutocracy, where most of the citizenry are sitting on the outside. Government functionaries feel no responsibility to the citizens. They believe their agencies exist to serve themselves, not the citizenry. They don’t see themselves as being employed by and responsible to the public but acting for themselves at their own whims.

We must take back our government (because they have stolen it away from us).

by Sylvia

Sunday Dec 30th, 2012 8:39 AM

I too am disturbed by seeing blue uniforms patrolling within and without the downtown library, and I appreciate the persistence in trying to get information and ensure transparency. I think Occupy Santa Cruz could make this a project, be available for comfort and a resource to those who don’t fit into the library patron image, have an ongoing presence during all open hours. There’s an opportunity to draw attention to a local problem – no place to shelter or sleep – in a positive way that might shame electeds into acting and reinvigorate Occupy.

by Bruce Holloway

Monday Dec 31st, 2012 8:42 AM

Robert, thanks for the chance to discuss some of this on your show yesterday, approximately between 4:00:00 and 4:30:00 here:

http://radiolibre.org/brb/brb121230.mp3

We never quite got around to the apparent violation of Brown Act subdivision 54957.5(c) in the form of a map which was not provided to the public at that meeting.

I’m going to miss Katherine Beiers. She has more brains and guts than almost anyone twice her size. Maybe she’ll apply to be the next citizen member of the library board.

I’m thinkin someone named Bren is a gal.

I wrote “Bruce Halloway, a member of the public in the audience at the December meeting, several times addressed the Board. On one occasion he remarked that Landers had refused to provide him with access to the previous meeting’s minutes, instead brushing him off and telling him to write out a Public Records Act request and wait 10 days.”

But I learned from Bruce in a later conversation (mentioned above by Bruce) on my radio show that he had actually been searching for earlier minutes–the minutes to recent meetings are on line. Apologies to Teresa and Bruce for this misunderstanding.

Also I was informed last week that a copy of all the complaints made by and to library staff last year in all branches of the library is now available for viewing at the City Council offices at City Hall at 809 Center St. Just tell them you’re looking for the Library Complaints Public Records Act information which Robert Norse requested.

As I understand it, these complaints will only be viewable for another few weeks before they’re returned to the storage archives and will then require another 10 days or more to secure. If anyone takes the time to go through them, please note your thoughts. I’ve only checked over a fraction of them so far.

Library Board to Consider Restrictive New Policies that Impact Homeless People (& You)

by Robert Norse ( rnorse3 [at] hotmail.com )
Friday Nov 30th, 2012 10:12 AM

On Monday December 3rd, the Library Joint Powers Authorities Board meets at the new Scotts Valley Library (251 Kings Village Rd.) to consider imposing new harsher policies regarding sleeping in the library, “smelling bad”, service animals, & unattended property. The matter was raised at a November meeting, but postponed according to Sentinel writer J.M. Brown (See http://www.santacruzsentinel.com/localnews/ci_21936587/santa-cruz-library-board-delays-suspension-policy-changes).
Libraries are a last refuge for homeless people and folks should demand expansion not contraction of access there.

According to Board member (and outgoing City Council member) Katherine Beiers (pronounced Buy-ers), the meeting is at the new library at 6:30 PM. Beiers office phone is 420-5024. Her home phone is 426-6108. Her e-mail is kbeiers [at] cityofsantacruz.com. In a phone interview over the radio yesterday, she said she’d not yet read her packet, but that John Barisone, City Attorney-for-Life will be there.

EXPANSION OF EARLIER CRACKDOWN
In the last several years, a First Alarm goon has taken to patrolling the library and library grounds, provoking complaints from one homeless patron that the burly wannabe cop followed him into the restroom to monitor his weewee. Benches have been removed. The area around the library has been made a “no trespass” zone after 9:30 PM or so. it seems to bel part of the “make Santa Cruz less welcoming” pogrom. Plus the police and their pals in the private “security” racket are empowered to interrogate, hassle,cite, and or arrest if homeless don’t show proper respect and deference and jump through the right hoops.

LACK OF SPECIFICS IN STAFF REPORT
There are no stats in the staff report itemizing the number of complaints received in the last year about the offending behaviors, how many people have been suspended or appealed, and why the current policy isn’t workable.

It’s similar to what happened when the law banning people from assembling in parking garages and lots was passed at the behest of outgoing Councilmember Ryan “Constitution for Dinner” Coonerty. No indication of a greater crime problem, but more police power to harass being granted–which is now being selectively used to target “suspicious” people (i.e. poor and homeless people).

PART OF A BROADER CRACKDOWN
With the four-fold increase in ticketing and concurrent survival gear destruction against homeless people on the levee, in the parks, and in the Pogonip to satisfy the Take-Back-Santa-Cruz bigots, the anti-protest curfews at City Hall, the County Building, and the Courts, the new forbidden zones adjacent to the levee, as well as the creation of 14′ “no go” zones around the big red Imagine anti-panhandling meters downtown–this library crackdown is another attack on poor and homeless people. Which is not clearly a response to real problems–at least, those problems are not articulated.

FIGHT BACK
Demand there be a delay until homeless people and advocates can be contacted and consulted. And until real information is available about the real need for them.

APPEAL FROM HUFF (Homeless United for Friendship & Freedom)
Becky Johnson sent out the following letter:

Dear HUFF members and friends,
At our Nov 21st meeting, HUFF passed a resolution urging HUFF members to attend the next two meetings of the Library Joint Powers Board re: new policies being considered which fundamentally change the haven-nature our libraries have come to function as in a world of ever diminishing social services where need is increasing, not diminishing.
Rules against backpacks, smells, sleeping, use of public space after hours etc. need to be carefully assessed.
The next meeting is at the Scotts Valley Branch of the Library on Monday, Dec 3 from 6:30PM – 8:30PM.
The next meeting is Jan 14th 2013 @ the SC Main Branch Library fro 6:30PM to 8:30PM.
Also: Please send a letter in advance to the members of the Board:

Dick English rpenglish [at] sbcglobal.net
Leigh Poitinger Vice Chair lpoitinger [at] comcast.net
Nancy Gerdt ngerdt45 [at] gmail.com
David Terrazas dterrazas [at] cityofsantacruz.com
Jim Reed jimreedsv [at] gmail.com
Katherine Beiers kbeiers [at] sbcglobal.net
Sam Storey Chair samforcapitola [at] att.net
Ellen Pirie ellen.pirie [at] co.santa-cruz.ca.us
Mark Stone mark.stone [at] co.santa-cruz.ca.us

Please post any responses you get or letters you write on line or send a copy to me at rnorse3 [at] hotmail.com . The reading area you save may be your own!

§Staff Report Continued

by Robert Norse Friday Nov 30th, 2012 10:12 AM

 


Comments  (Hide Comments)

by Observer

Friday Nov 30th, 2012 12:59 PM

Why on earth should the library grounds not be closed after 9:30PM? It’s a library, not a park or homeless shelter.

by G

Friday Nov 30th, 2012 3:39 PM

Instead of yet more selective persecution and overpriced security theater; how about outing some real criminals that break real laws for real dollar amounts?

Oh, right, those gangsters run things, never mind.

by sane person

Saturday Dec 1st, 2012 12:01 PM

A library is NOT a homeless shelter. It is no longer a safe environment for kids. Also, the smell IS becoming unbearable in there. Look what happened in Berkeley. Santa Cruz Library is going the same way.

by sane person

Saturday Dec 1st, 2012 5:34 PM

Also, it is Norse’s own projection that “smelling bad” is some kind of monopoly held by homeless people. I know housed people who smell awful and homeless people who do their best to find access to regular showers.

It is typical of how he ACTUALLY views homeless folks that he ASSUMES that “smelling bad”= homeless. I don’t care who is stinking up the place: take a shower, stinkies!

Either way, I support the Homeless Services Center to help out the homeless. I support County Health to fund health for the poor. I support the EDD to find jobs for the unemployed. I support the LIBRARY TO PROVIDE ACCESS TO FREE BOOKS AND MEDIA TO THE ENTIRE COMMUNITY, THAT’S THEIR JOB AND THEIR ONLY JOB! That’s it, that’s all they have to do. And Norse, you want to make their job harder.

In SLO, they have figured out a humane and friendly way to deal with this issue…

http://articles.latimes.com/2005/mar/05/local/me-smell5

In Santa Barbara and San Luis Obispo, patrons who smell are not simply shown the door, McGee and Macias said. They are provided with a means of correcting the problem.

“We seldom have to ask someone to leave,” McGee said. “It rarely happens. If it does we’re very careful to give coupons about where they can wash their clothes or take a shower. We do it in as humane a way as possible.”

by John E. Colby

Saturday Dec 1st, 2012 6:31 PM

If the library grounds are arbitrarily closed at 9:30 P.M., then I will no longer be able to return books after business hours, after 9:30 P.M. That doesn’t seem right. Another abridgment of a right of access in order to harass the homeless.

by sane person

Saturday Dec 1st, 2012 7:59 PM

Where is it stated in library rules that you may not drop books through a drop slot after 9:30, Mr. Cohen? I have not heard that before. I only see it in Norse’s statement, and he is clearly not a credible, reliable source.

by Robert Norse

Saturday Dec 1st, 2012 9:58 PM

The posted hours forbid being on library property after 9:30 PM or thereabouts. So, yes, it’s technically illegal to return books late at night through the outdoor slot. Just as its illegal to try to go read the City Council agenda after 10:30 PM at its posted spot outside City Council chambers.

You’re only likely to be hassled, however, if you linger to rest on one of the few remaining benches, or perhaps try to use the lone payphone there and look raggedy. Or sit with your laptop nearby using the library wi-fi “after hours”. The last actually happened to Craig Canada even before the new “no trespassing at night” hours were posted in the late summer of 2010.

Public areas are places where everyone should have the right to “hang out”–bums, bigots, blowhards–you name it.

The exclusionary policy at night isn’t a matter of setting hours for “doing business” at all, but for the bad business of running off homeless people who socialize, rest, and seek mutual companionship there away from the hassles of Pacific Avenue. Naturally bigots (those who term homeless people “bums”) don’t have any problem excluding the poor. Hopefully the rest of us do.

Also the “no trespassing at night” policy was not subject to any kind of public input or debate. No showing of a need for it was made. It was cooked up in secret between the police chief Kevin Vogel, the head of parks and rec Dannettee Shoemaker(who controls these spaces outdoors), the mayor (Coonerty at the time), and City Manager Bernal. Or so I was told by Shoemaker in August of 2010.

I spoke with Council members and Library Board members Beiers and Terrazas at the Homelessness Summit earlier today. Beiers had no idea how she was going to vote; Terrazas neither. Neither seemed to know what the rules were currently and to what extent the rules were being changed as well as what specific evidence had been provided to show that such a change was necessary or beneficial. I suggest people e-mail them at their above addresses.

Beiers promised to “try” to forward me a set of the current rules and how they’d be changed. Terrazas evaded repeated attempts to get a meeting time, saying he had no time until late Monday afternoon (when it probably wouldn’t make any difference, since that’s right before the meeting). He did reluctantly indicate a willingness to be accessible after 3 PM on Monday.

E-mail them and other board members. Demand to know the specific complaints that have led to both the current proposed changes, and whether the earlier “forbidden zones at night” homeless-begone proposals went through their board formally or informally. Also urge that the library property be declared open at night. It’s already a crime to sleep there, cover up with blankets, or set up camping equipment with the intention of remaining overnight.

And when will the benches be restored to the sides of the building?

Ask the questions. Demand the answers.

I’ve never had smell problems with anyone in the library (again, where are the reports?). But the stench of bigotry hangs heavy over some of the comments.

by Robert Norse

Saturday Dec 1st, 2012 10:06 PM

If you agree with these concerns, e-mail library board members…

Library Board to Consider Restrictive New Policies
that Impact Homeless People (& You)

Monday December 3rd 6:30 PM , the Library Joint Powers Authorities Board meets at the new Scotts Valley Library (251 Kings Village Rd.) to consider imposing new harsher policies regarding sleeping in the library, “smelling bad”, service animals, & unattended property. Libraries are a last refuge for homeless people and folks should demand expansion not contraction of access there.

LACK OF SPECIFICS IN STAFF REPORT (http://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2012/11/30/18726836.php)
There are no stats in the staff report itemizing the number of complaints received in the last year about the offending behaviors, how many people have been suspended or appealed, and why the current policy isn’t workable.
It’s similar to what happened when the law banning people from assembling in parking garages and lots was passed at the behest of outgoing Council member Ryan “Constitution for Dinner” Coonerty. No indication of a greater crime problem, but more police power to harass—now being selectively used to target “suspicious” people (i.e. poor and homeless people).

EXPANSION OF EARLIER CRACKDOWN $80,000 funds a First Alarm goon patrolling the library and grounds, provoking complaints from one homeless patron that the burly wannabe cop followed him into the restroom to monitor his weewee. Benches have been removed. The area around the library has been made a “no trespass” zone after 9:30 PM–part of the “make Santa Cruz less welcoming to people experiencing homeless” agenda. Police and security thugs can now interrogate, hassle,cite, and or arrest if homeless don’t show proper respect and deference and jump through the right hoops for being there.

PART OF A BROADER CRACKDOWN There is a four-fold increase in ticketing and concurrent survival gear destruction against homeless people on the levee, in the parks, and in the Pogonip (to respond to bogus security concerns). Also new: the anti-Occupy curfews at City Hall, the County Building, and the Courts, the new forbidden zones adjacent to the levee, as well as the creation of 14′ “no go” zones around the big red Imagine anti-panhandling meters downtown, This library crackdown adding new library rules is another fashionable attack on poor and homeless people.

FIGHT BACK Demand restoration of the library as a welcoming space! Document and make public the real complaints and delay until homeless people and advocates can be contacted and consulted. And until real information is available about the real need for them.

HUFF resolution: Attend the next two meetings of the Board, The new policies fundamentally change the haven-nature our libraries have come to function as in a world of ever diminishing social services where need is increasing, not diminishing. Rules against backpacks, smells, sleeping, use of public space after hours etc. need to be carefully assessed.

Send a letter this weekend to the members of the Board:

Sam Storey Chair samforcapitola [at] att.net Leigh Poitinger Vice Chair lpoitinger [at] comcast.net
Nancy Gerdt ngerdt45 [at] gmail.com David Terrazas dterrazas [at] cityofsantacruz.com
Jim Reed jimreedsv [at] gmail.com Katherine Beiers kbeiers [at] sbcglobal.net
Ellen Pirie ellen.pirie [at] co.santa-cruz.ca.us Dick English rpenglish [at] sbcglobal.net
Mark Stone mark.stone [at] co.santa-cruz.ca.us

by .h

Sunday Dec 2nd, 2012 9:45 AM

since I left California… the inequality between upper-middle class, working class, and destitute classes in California is even more prominent. (there is such a small middle class). It would be easy to have an attitude that the people with money to afford housing in Santa Cruz should be confronted as often as possible about the situations of other people. However, the problem is that this can’t even be addressed at the individual level. Individual homeowners who are bothered by not being able to use the library or go downtown can’t go home and do anything about it. And I find that many computer programmers/doctors and so forth are fairly aware of social problems, (except for a few who embrace Ayn Rand type principles), even if they aren’t quite motivated to a radical solution yet. Even if the city of Santa Cruz decided to spend more on ‘charity’ like food banks and shelters, there is an endless tide of more destitute people. The high price of even a room in a slum apartment ($700 or more) results from the fact that this region has a lot of jobs where people are paid six figure salaries for their labor (plus people with investment income) and this drives up prices for everyone else, down to the immigrants working under minimum wage.
There is no easy solution, but I’m personally terrified by the fact that we’re technically still in the recession, and we can only expect the economy in San Francisco and Silicon valley to rev up more in the next year, and what happens when prices get even more expensive??

by John E. Colby

Sunday Dec 2nd, 2012 9:05 PM

Santa Cruz’s campaign against the homeless, stoked by the Sentinel/Patch and driven by a hate filled group of angry bigots, bears some similarities to the Nazi’s cleansing of German society of what they called degenerates and undesirables. One should be mindful before one joins this campaign how far it might go and where it might end.

by Observer

Sunday Dec 2nd, 2012 10:42 PM

“… it’s technically illegal to return books late at night through the outdoor slot…
You’re only likely to be hassled, however, if you linger to rest on one of the few remaining benches…”

Because ‘lingering on the benches’ has nothing to do with returning a library book. It’s a library, not a shelter.

by Observant

Monday Dec 3rd, 2012 12:59 AM

LOL. Couldn’t have said it better. I’m fairly certain that if one were to go return a book through a slot at 10 pm, no one would look askance, regardless of the comportment of the returner. It’s when this turns into a multitasking exercise (as in, “Honey, I’m going to step out to return “Voyage of The Beagle” and then I’m going to sleep on the benches outside the Library till 6 am, after which I’ll take a crap in the bush by the north entrance. See you in the morning!”) that one invites scrutiny.

I know, I know. It’s selective enforcement. Go ahead and shoot me.

by Gross exaggeration

Monday Dec 3rd, 2012 8:24 AM

“Nazi cleansing”..because the community grows tired of having a small band of transients monopolize the library? Oh please. You’re going to compare telling a couple of bums, who often smell odious and use the building for a sleeping lounge and bathing area as opposed to its intended purpose….and compare that to Nazi cleansing?

*lol* You’ve lost your perspective.

by Sylvia

Monday Dec 3rd, 2012 11:01 AM

Some people use the library as a daytime shelter, warmth, bathrooms, … Some of those people have trouble with rules and regulation and the library has hired a security person to patrol and be available. And tonight the board is considering more limitations on behavior and appearance. I see an opportunity for Occupy Santa Cruz to organize itself, be available in shifts, reach out, provide individual personal support, find out what’s lacking in the available supports.

by John E. Colby

Monday Dec 3rd, 2012 4:38 PM

If you read my post as it was meant to be, you would realize that I am referring to the Santa Cruz campaign against the homeless in total, not just at the library. Santa Cruz is trying to vilify and erase the homeless from the community and public spaces. If you read about what the Nazis did just after they came to power the campaigns bear striking similarities.

by Observant

Monday Dec 3rd, 2012 7:36 PM

Unlike you guys, I don’t have a fascination with the Nazis, nor do I draw any specific parallels between them and contemporary social policy. Could you please elaborate on why you feel that what the Nazis did to gypsys, homosexuals, Jews and so on – things such as forced labor and extermination in concentration camps – sees a modern day equivalent in the Santa Cruz City Council telling people to take a shower, leave the library at 9:30 pm and to stop crapping in the bushes? It really seems like an astounding leap of logic to jump from the former to the latter.

Really, what, besides dramatic emphasis, supports your position?

by John E. Colby

Monday Dec 3rd, 2012 9:47 PM

Here’s a history lesson for you. Homeless people were targeted by the Nazis to die in concentration camps.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_triangle_(badge)

by Robert Norse

Monday Dec 3rd, 2012 10:26 PM

Nazis didn’t begin with forced labor camps, but rather by proscribing classes of people. That, I think, is the point of the comparison. When you deny people the right to sleep at night, the right to assemble in public, the right to show their wares, the right to use public services, etc., you start down that long road. Which is what Santa Cruz (and other cities) are doing (and have done for a number of years).

It’s maliciously deceptive to misdescribe the rule changes as “telling people to take a shower, leave the library at 9:30 pm and to stop crapping in the bushes”. It’s a matter of driving the homeless out of town–the library closes much earlier, but the grounds are now forbidden after 9:30 PM–specifically to deny homeless people a traditional place of refuge. Ditto with the removal of the benches. Crap in the bushes? Haven’t heard specific complaints, but I wouldn’t be surprised since public bathrooms close at night. Surprised why people fall asleep in libraries when it’s illegal to sleep at night? I’m not.

UNEXPECTED VICTORY
More upbeat, however, was the 5-4 decision of the Library Board to defeat a proposal to add a Sleeping Ban to its lilbrary policy. This was unexpected until the very last moment. Katherine Beiers, who dissented from the broader motion supporting harsher policies against “rule breakers” (rules being things like having unattended property, smelling bad, and having a dog in the library), moved to divide the question, and finally got a substitute motion passed over the confusion of David Terazzas, which passed everything but the Sleeping Ban.

The Sleeping Ban was then proposed as a separate motion (with pretexts like sleepers were “in the way”, “misusing the library for a purpose for which it was not intended”, “discomforting others”, “blocking access” and other pretexts that ignored the basic “they make us uncomfortable and we want a simple rule to exclude them”). Based on the general silence seeming to give consent to the Ban, this seemed like it would be Beiers alone, but Samuel Story gave an eloquent statement, and others apparently jumped on board. For once, the staff didn’t get their way.

BROADER DEFEAT
But the victory was only on that one issue–and perhaps because the issue was what each speaker focused on–how libraries were sanctuaries, how there’d been a host of anti-homeless rules around the library, how the city-wide sleeping ban added insult to injury, how winter and Xmas time was the wrong time to bring the hammer down, etc. Apparently it all had an impact.

Of course, the staff got a new policy that allows for much longer suspensions for a variety of rules that weren’t available for the public to read (there was no agenda packet available for the public). There was also a peculiar process that didn’t allow public comment on any staff items, except, suddenly, the new policies issue, which was packaged as a “staff report” and not as an action item. I tried to raise this, but was silenced by Story, the chair of the meeting.

I did speak with Teresa, the chief librarian who was pushing these restrictive rules, saying that the existing policy just allowed for a 30-day suspension followed by a restraining order (that’s now changed, and there can be much longer suspensions after the 4th warning). When I asked her how many people came back to repeat the policy after being suspended for thirty days, she had no stats or figures. she did say that they’d only issued one restraining order this year but that was because her staff was “heavily burdened”.

Another member of the public objected on a different issue that the library had failed to provide a copy of the prior agenda on request, insisting that he fill out a written public records act request and wait 10 days because of “staff problems”.

All very arrogant and unlikely–showing again that rules (as when the Homeless Lack of Services Center was closed–and remains closed) to “non-business” assembly during the day it was for the convenience of the staff. Upside down logic since the staff are supposed to be serving the public. But chillingly similar to why the Parking Lot Paranoia law (banning people from reading books in their cars in city parking lots, or gathering in a parking lot)—as Ryan Coonerty explained it–to accommodate city staff complaints (as well as the anxieties of his employees at the Bookshop Santa Cruz).

Still, it showed that liberals like to keep the pretty make-up on, particularly if enough people show up to challenge the latest civil rights seizure. I admit that I even applauded and thanked John Leopold (who actually proposed the motion to ban sleeping, but voting not to do so).

Nice work, Occupy Santa Cruz activists (all the critics were from Occupy Santa Cruz, and all over 50). Now we have to plan for the next library sleep-in when we receive reports of people being suspended from the library for objecting when they’re told to leave their backpacks outside to be stolen.

by Observant

Tuesday Dec 4th, 2012 1:34 AM

It seems to me that what is maliciously deceptive is to characterize the application of common sense and traditional societal mores to this situation as somehow akin to, or a precursor of, the act of executing homeless people in a concentration camp. And I’m using the term “traditional” in an unadulterated sense, invoking as I am millennia-old societal boundaries in society. Using the term to describe an out-of-control drum circle at the Farmers Market (thank you, Nesh and Lulu’s for decisively stomping that out) or a runaway problem with people sleeping and showering in the library, things that developed over the past 10 or 20 years, is delusional at best, and deceptive at worst.

That hyperlink is bad, but I get the point. It’s not that I don’t know the history. What I don’t follow are these massive leaps of logic. You are simply not making a convincing case that a concentration camp is in store for us in the future, near or distant.

You guys don’t like rules and boundaries, except for your sworn enemies. This is a sociopathic mindset that I’d venture traces its roots back to your failed and continuing adolescence. Your parents should have corrected this with a strong regimen of discipline. It’s too late for that at this point, unfortunately, so we now have to all deal with it, I suppose.

I’d still really like to hear a convincing argument from you guys about how closing the library grounds at 9:30 pm today is going to result in the future establishment of a modern-day Dachau in the Santa Cruz city limits. Not a metaphorical concentration camp, but an actual one, where Ryan Coonerty dons a Wehrmacht uniform and charges about gassing people like Linda Lemaster, Shane Maxfield, Donna Deiss and White Dove.

I’m not holding my breath, though.

In response to Norse critics: Here is a version of a respected saying by Pastor Martin Niemoeller, 1892-1984 (googol “First they came”, then see the Wikipedia entry):

“When the Nazis came for the communists,
I remained silent;
I was not a communist.

“When they locked up the social democrats,
I remained silent;
I was not a social democrat.

“When they came for the trade unionists,
I did not speak out;
I was not a trade unionist.

“When they came for the Jews,
I remained silent;
I wasn’t a Jew.

“When they came for me,
there was no one left to speak out.”

–Lydia Blanchard

by Sylvia

Tuesday Dec 4th, 2012 9:03 AM

I think the Brown Act governs boards and commissions. I think it’s a violation of good process to take an action on a staff report recommendation that isn’t explicitly listed on the public agenda. It’s a good thing Robert and others are tracking this. It takes a lot of diligence to follow our electeds and their appointees.

The Mental Health Advisory Board used the same kind of strategy to hide the plans for spending $13 million on a local Psychiatric Health Facility.

Naming and shaming draws public attention and protest. Providing listening and support one on one could detour around any regulations, arguably make enough impact to quell the librarians.

by grounded in reality

Tuesday Dec 4th, 2012 9:20 AM

You’re evading and still not answering a very direct question, Robert. Can you answer Observant and articulate an intellectual, non-evasive equivalence between the given rules of operation for the library and executing 8 million people? Do you think continually avoiding civil discourse in lieu of extreme soap-box hyperbole helps or hinders your credibility and, ultimately, your cause?

by Robert Norse

Tuesday Dec 4th, 2012 10:25 AM

TROLL TITTLE-TATTLE
As usual,critics with questions or denunciations are invited to call in to my radio show where this matter will be discussed at greater length. They rarely do, but the opportunity is there. See times and numbers above.

It’s clear however that criminalizing poor people outside engaged in survival behavior and repeatedly restricting the space that they’re allowed to use is at the very least a way of making folks unwelcome. Given the high death rate for homeless folks each year, it also impacts their health and safety since the ability to gather in groups and shelter oneself, or even to rest, impacts those conditions. This seems to me so obvious as to be beyond dispute, but those who defend the evil laws and procedures that perpetuate and aggravate these conditions needs some rationale, so they find it where they can.

MORE ON THE BOARD MEETING
These issues were a key factor in the dissent on the Library Board last night around approving a Sleeping Ban in the library (aside from it’s being a break not just with traditional Santa Cruz library policy, but a break with library policy historically nationwide (as articulated by several former librarians who spoke).

The Board made no objection to the public-excluding procedures used around missing information, missing agendas, strange itemizing as action items under “staff reports”, and an unequal treatment of public comment (only allowed for one “staff report” item).

David Terazzas seemed particularly clueless and unhelpful–a Ryan Coonerty in training–at this meeting. Neither he nor Beiers provided any information prior to the meeting. Beiers redeemed herself in a small way by expressing a dissent on the Sleeping Ban issue, which led to a general retreat on that issue. However, more broadly she empowered the library to impose much harsher penalties on “rules violations”.

For those familiar with the Downtown Ordinances, we know how this kind of authority has been beern abused.

RULES WORSHIP
The only legitimate basis for being asked to leave the library (much less suspension) is actual disruption that interferes with other patrons. This should be and probably is decided on a case-by-case basis. However the new powers granted staff provide much more room for mischief. Patrons uncomfortable with the sight or scent of homeless people may now feel empowered to create a gated zone, regardless of the wishes of the staff–given the modified suspension procedures and new “unattended property”and “bad smell” rules. “It’s the rule!” after all.

I don’t necessarily think that’s what the library staff were trying to do or want to do in the future, but the rules passed may allow for that. A “rules violation” is much different than a patron complaining about being interfered with in a real and tangible way that can’t be resolved peacefully at the time. “Rules violations” are used by control freaks to impose a repressive kind of order and exact punishments when there are no real problems other than someone squeaking “you’re not obeying the rules”.

Draconian authority to enforce rules is an evil thing. It also creates a darker kind of climate which improperly and unwisely empowers people in positions of power or makes them subject to malicious manipulation.

Since no record of the actual complaints, suspensions, repeat problems, was made available to the Board last night, I’m following up with a Public Records Act request. PHONE At last night’s meeting, the public was told to “go on line” to read the agenda packet (which didn’t contain the actual complaint history in any detail nor how effective suspensions were).

CONTACTING THE FUHRER
Another member of the public complained about getting stonewalled when he previously asked for a copy of the prior agenda and minutes–on an issue entirely unrelated to the Spank-the-Homeless issue–told by Teresa Landers, Library Boss, that he’d have to wait 10 days and make a written public records act request because of “staff problems”.

Teresa is the head cheese at the library (Director of the Libraries) apparently responsible only to the Library Joint Powers Board (the group that met last night). Not sure who hires and fires her or what her salary is–might be worth looking into. She told me she’s been around for 3 1/2 years.

She seemed to be the driving force behind these changes–but that was only my impression and I only spoke with her briefly. Still she seemed quite adamant. Full disclosure: working library staff members that I’ve seen at the front desk of the main library were supportive of her changes when she called for their opinions. As with City Council’s staff “experts”, she seemed good at leading the Board around.

As a special treat, city attorney John Barisone was there, helping to smooth over the wrinkles in the “eliminate the unworthy” from library use.

Teresa’s e-mail is landerst [at] santacruzpl.org Her phone number is 831-427-7706 X7612 (hours 8 AM to 5 PM).

by Robert Norse

Tuesday Dec 4th, 2012 10:28 AM

I e-mailed this off about an hour ago. Teresa has 10 days to reply (unless she seeks an extension).

From: rnorse3 [at] hotmail.com
To: landerst [at] santacruzpl.org

Subject: Public Records Act Request
Date: Tue, 4 Dec 2012 09:46:10 -0800

To whom It May Concern:

Please provide access to all copies of complaints against patrons at all branches of the Public Library system from Jan 1, 2012 through the present as well as any records, e-mails, statements, written, audio, or visual regarding library policies impacting library rules that might result in a warning or suspension of library access. This would include communications to and from the public, public officials, police, security agencies, and any other group or person around this issue.

Please also provide access to copies of all agendas and minutes of the Board’s meetings through 2012.

I prefer e-mail access to these records. In the event this is not possible, I would like to see the records prior to deciding which ones I need to copy.

Please advise me whether a hard copy of the minutes of the prior meeting and agenda packet was available at each of these meetings.

Further, please advise me as to whether action items were listed as such on the agendas.

Finally, please advise me as to whether a public comment was provided for each agenda item (as it was not at the December 3rd meeting, except for the one “staff report” item on the rule changes).

I would suggest you publicly announce all these conditions will be corrected at the next meeting or face a Brown Act complaint.

If you have any questions regarding this request, feel free to call me.

Thanks in advance for your assistance.

Robert Norse
(831-423-4833)

by No

Tuesday Dec 4th, 2012 2:34 PM

…it’s time to stop demanding rights and start TAKING them. Demands have gotten us nowhere, and the TBSC yuppies won’t have any of it. They (and other anti- homeless/freedom/civil-rights groups) are TAKING from others, now it’s time to TAKE from them.

by G

Tuesday Dec 4th, 2012 3:43 PM

Re takings; sounds like The Prince v Discourses On Livy…

by As expected

Tuesday Dec 4th, 2012 5:50 PM

Mr. Norse’s comparison of the Santa Cruz situation is both odious and laughable. Not unexpected though, as those characteristics personify him to me and many others.

Here’s why I think the comparison is unequal and a joke Mr. Norse:

1) The nazis also killed drug addicts. If that were the case in Santa Cruz?..there’d be nobody left to be passing ordinances against.

2) Last I checked, the Jews weren’t a population that was 100% dependent upon community support for their existance.

3) Last I heard, the Nazi’s weren’t funding food programs and shelters and counseling and other services to sustain Jewish existence.

Nuff said. You go right along with your odious comparisons. I think they do more damage to Santa Cruz-Homeless relationship than darn near any other single thing I can think of in Santa Cruz. But hey, you think you’re doing some good, and I think you’re sinking your own ship for me? I call that a win-win, so keep up the good work sir.

…but the “Santa Cruz enforcement is similar to Nazism” metaphor you and Colby have introduced is a joke to any right minded person.

by RazerRay

Tuesday Dec 4th, 2012 7:30 PM

bo.jpg
bo.jpg

This is currently under discussion at the Library Board where I live. One commenter on an IndyMedia post has mentioned that San Diego and another city take a principled proactive approach and give the person with the offending odor a coupon for a shower at a local facility. Also note that foul odor can be a medical condition, and in light of many city facilities requesting a fragrance-free environment from their patrons, it may make it impossible for someone with an affliction such as “Stinkfoot” (Bromhidrosis http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Body_odor#Medical_conditions) to use public facilities.

http://www.quora.com/Should-public-libraries-have-showers-for-homeless-people

by RazerRay

Tuesday Dec 4th, 2012 7:46 PM

Copy the following to embed the movie into another web page:

download video: frank_zappa___stinkfoot_1.mp4 (9.6MB)

The last word on stinkfoot from someone who wore his Python Boots too tight. But seriously. I had a friend who was refused enlistment in the US Navy during the Vietnam war due to this condition.

by human

Tuesday Dec 4th, 2012 9:25 PM

Its not right to make me feel bad for being legitly disabled. I get treated like a sub human because of it. Just cuz ure not happy with the economy doesnt mean you can treat me like a war criminal. Stop this practice. Move on with your life. You shouldn’t own pets.

by John E. Colby

Tuesday Dec 4th, 2012 11:36 PM

The Nazis targeted the homeless (“work-shy”) as degenerates and undesirables. The camps were not the beginning point of the Nazi’s campaign against their victims. They began with harassment, violence and civil rights violations. They ramped it up a bit before they reached the concentration camp stage.

A certain bigoted group of Santa Cruz residents, especially in public forums like the Sentinel comments sections, call for cleansing the homeless from our community. They say, “kick the bums out”. This kind of cleansing is not qualitatively different from the ethnic cleansing pursued in the former Yugoslavia and by the Nazis and their satellite nations in WW 2. Ethnic cleansing is the last step before genocide.

What happens when those who wish to purge Santa Cruz of the homeless are met with resistance from a homeless population that just won’t budge? I imagine increased harassment, violence and finally a mob. When organized by a neoliberal state with fascist leanings like our local government this is cleansing akin to ethnic cleansing just short of genocide. Thus I suggest that people be careful when slinging hate speech around, because it may lead to serious consequences.

at http://www.santacruzsentinel.com/localnews/ci_22125587/library-board-votes-down-sleeping-ban and check out the well-reasoned dispassionate comments that follow the main story. Clearly regular patrols of each individual aisle in this threatened building [expecially the Downtown Library, long a terrorist haven) are long overdue…

by Robert Norse

Thursday Dec 6th, 2012 3:07 AM

It’s not clear to me whether Rhode Island’s Homeless Bill of Rights is being effectively used to combat the Bigots’ Brigade there, but here’s activist Paul Boden’s call for supporting Ammiano’s California Homeless Bill of Rights:

http://www.sfgate.com/opinion/openforum/article/California-needs-rights-for-homeless-4091545.php

by Diane

Thursday Dec 6th, 2012 4:14 AM

A homeless woman, living in her car, who had lived and worked in Santa Clara County all her liife (worked in electronics where they toss you out like so much garbage, years before retirement age in the Bay Area) was sitting quietly on a bench outside of the library (HER FRICKING LIBRARY, AS MUCH, IF NOT MORE, THAN THE PREDATOR CLASS WHO RUN SILICON VALLEY) with a homeless sign in her lap, She was not vocally soliciting money, and quite pleasant to speak with, but was inhumanely booted from the premises by an inhuman witch who worked at the library, may that woman rot in hell.

by Robert Norse

Thursday Dec 6th, 2012 10:51 AM

A sobering and saddening story from Salinas: http://www.thecalifornian.com/article/20121129/news01/311290009/salinas-man-s-friends-stunned-by-beating .

This kind of violence is reportedly happening via police officers according to reports I’m getting at the Red Church on Monday nights:

Please keep your eyes open, your cameras handy, and take the time to post what you see.

Or call in to my radio show.

by RazerRay

Thursday Dec 6th, 2012 5:57 PM

write_drunk_-_hemmingway.jpg
write_drunk_-_hemmingway….

Robert Norse:
This kind of violence is reportedly happening via police officers according to reports I’m getting at the Red Church on Monday nights.

The only people who actually speak to you are winos too drunk at the time to even know what happened, but like ADDICTS, it couldn’t have been their fault they turned and tried to walk away or acted combative according to the police. Seriously hostile words are certainly germane to being drunk and stoopid on the street to the best of my recollection of why I’ve punched drinkers out before myself.

“The police beat me up for no reason” is almost always a crock of shit story if one just asks simple questions.

But Robert “KNOWS” the answers, and puts them in the mouths of people which is why NO ONE should speak into his recorder at all. He’s simply a propagandist who has NO INTEREST in the veracity or safety of his sources (Ask about his dry snitching me as a potential building squatter) and he makes “Collages” of conversations which he puts on the air, with his un-verified commentary, as if it’s the truth.

Just like MSM news… and just as false.

Robert fails the “Edit Sober” test. His victims were drunk, and so is he… With disinformation.

by Observant

Friday Dec 7th, 2012 11:12 AM

From the article Robert cites:

“Anderson’s injuries were so severe that he had to be flown by air ambulance to a San Jose hospital. On Wednesday, Salinas police Officer Miguel Cabrera said Anderson is no longer in a coma. He’s still recovering at the hospital, Cabrera said”.

The article further states that Anderson was beaten “nearly to death”.

Now, here’s Robert Norse:

“This kind of violence is reportedly happening via police officers according to reports I’m getting at the Red Church on Monday nights”.

Really, Robert? So you say that Santa Cruz police officers are beating people nearly to death at the Red Church, and that these people are being airlifted to San Jose in comas? This is a major scoop, Robert. You realize that, don’t you?

by Robert Norse

Friday Dec 7th, 2012 6:08 PM

Several reports of police slamming down homeless people to the sidewalk and against their car are what I’m referring to. There have been three deaths in the County Jail this year, incidentally. But no–no beatings of that intensity reported to me. Sorry for any confusion. Police violence of any kind is a matter of grave concern, particularly when coupled with cover charges of “resisting arrest”.

We know that police departments don’t do that sort of thing, right? Oh, wait, Oakland just had an oversight guy with the power to spend and fire appointed because the OPD can’t control its violent force. And I think I heard something about the LAPD Ramparts scandal too.

Please post specifics of anything you observe or experience here.

by Alex Darocy

( alex [at] alexdarocy.com ) Friday Dec 7th, 2012 6:22 PM

Right after the raids on the homeless in Santa Cruz began in late July/early August, I interviewed two homeless people who said they were roughed up by the police when they were sleeping near the San Lorenzo River area. Many others in San Lorenzo Park and near the river levee at that time also reported to me that they had been yelled at and/or treated poorly in some way by the police. They all felt their experiences were directly related to the orchestrated raids and the resulting escalated attitude on the part of the SCPD.

by Alex Darocy

( alex [at] alexdarocy.com ) Saturday Dec 8th, 2012 12:23 PM

There is of course, a history of organized violence against local homeless people by the Santa Cruz Police Department, and that history could still be fresh in the minds of those who may be homeless today.

In this video I shot of Deputy Police Chief Steve Clark in February, Brent Adams briefly questions Clark about the “Code Blue” program of organized police violence against the homeless, which Clark states in the video, resulted in charges being leveled against the police, which then created an opportunity for him to join the force when he was first starting here.

http://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2012/02/17/18707600.php#18707603

(The discussion begins at minute 4:00 of the video)

by RazerRay

Saturday Dec 8th, 2012 6:48 PM

cigarette_criminals.jpg
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Code Blue… Cattanni Reyes Chevalier… a couple of others working off-duty as thugs in consort with on-duty officers was real and the whole PD got roughed up by the State. That was in the early 1980s right? I remember. I SAW THEM IN ACTION.

NOTHING like this is happening, and you know I know. There’s a WHOLE BUNCH OF OTHER STUFF like kids growing up in a town where they KNOW (rightly or wrong) that they’re never gonna raise a next generation of family here so they become alkies and junkies and crackheads and, just as programmed by AmeriKKKan society, blame and attack anyone they see as responsible for those circumstances.

Guess who gets attacked? Or Junkie action as seen on Depot Hill a few weeks ago. Most of those people have lived here for years if not all their lives.

As far as the SCPD goes.. The thuggery is institutionalized now. The targeting people for tickets… A security guard standing nearby while one tries to have a private conversation on Pacific or on a bench by the library with a friend. They changed the “invisible lines” by the newsstand at Walnut in regard to where one may smoke last night and gave someone a ticket.

Harassment… Dissuasion… As I mentioned above DON’T EVER turn your back on them or they’ll tackle you down for fleeing (and if you have ANY alcohol in you TSOL 4 U).

But NOTHING EVEN REMOTELY RESEMBLING “Code Blue”. A moniker unknown to me until recently.

Did Robert Norse think that nifty degrading phrase up?

Those guys were OUT-OF-UNIFORM BLACKSHIRTS, and a local merchant blew them up… Because they, AS INDIVIDUALS, were way out of line.

The SCPD as a police agency is Out of Line now. They’ve been politicized to the point where they no longer function correctly as protectors of the community, but are driven to select who is defined as “community”, and if anything, the officers on the SCPD, by their very involvement in that sort of law enforcement “normality”, are individually ethic-less and corrupt.

by Alex Darocy

( alex [at] alexdarocy.com ) Saturday Dec 8th, 2012 7:44 PM

Thanks for adding some info, Ray. I wasn’t suggesting that the current violence practiced by some in the SCPD against homeless people is on par with that of the “Code Blue” days (that was Brent’s recollection of the name. I remember it had the word “blue” in it, but I don’t recall exactly what it was called, though I was also living in the area at the time).

I was merely providing some background info that pertains to why people now might want to compare the reign of the SCPD to that of the Nazis. Considering the fact that the “Code Blue” days were 30 years or so ago, and that current Deputy Chief Steve Clark was hired as a result, I see the events as still relevant.

by John E. Colby

Saturday Dec 8th, 2012 9:43 PM

The Sentinel is starting to reap what they have sowed. The anti-homeless sentiment they have been stoking has resulted in the Sentinel comment forums overflowing with anti-homeless hate speech. Regrettable that our local newspaper is so irresponsible. This marks more than a hundred year tradition of the Sentinel inciting hatred towards minorities.

by A Soldier and a Jew

Sunday Dec 9th, 2012 3:41 PM

Drawing a parallel between any modern day government and the Nazis is callous and disrespectful to those of us who lived through that time. There are very few of us left, but please be sensitive to those of us who are.

I don’t know much about your city council because I live in Freedom, but I can’t imagine they’re anything like Nazis.

So please refrain from disrespecting a whole generation, my brethren, who sacrificed so you could say what you say here.

by John E. Colby

Sunday Dec 9th, 2012 5:49 PM

It’s not disrespectful to the victims of the Nazi regime to point out analogies with present day regimes. In fact, the saying “Never again!”, requires that we point these similarities out.

by Observant

Sunday Dec 9th, 2012 6:04 PM

I think the commenter’s point is that there isn’t a meaningful analogy between the Santa Cruz PD ticketing you for smoking in a no-smoking zone, and the horrific excesses of the Nazis. None whatsoever.

This exercise in the Theatre of the Absurd, flashing Sieg Heil salutes at City Council, and calling people bigots, Nazis, Fascists if they disagree with you, has real emotional impact on people who have lived through actual bigotry, actual Nazis and actual Fascists.

Bandying these powerfully symbolic words around is incredibly insensitive and selfish. There are other more appropriate ways to express your dismay with the PD and City Council. Try using them. It would advance the dialogue immeasurably.

by John E. Colby

Sunday Dec 9th, 2012 6:32 PM

You keep misrepresenting the analogy to Nazism.

It’s not about an SCPD officer ticketing a homeless person for smoking. It’s about a culture of hate given authority by a city government which has whittled away relentlessly at civil rights. The city’s anti-homeless campaign, whipped up with anti-homeless hatred by the Sentinel, is happening within the context of our federal government taking off the gloves with its own citizens with terrible brutality reminiscent of fascist states like the Nazi regime while it pursues endless imperial wars abroad.

by Helper

Sunday Dec 9th, 2012 10:22 PM

I’m going to throw you guys a bone, since you can’t seem to argue your way out of a paper bag.

I’m guessing that your use of the terms “Nazi” and “fascist” are epithetical, and one is expected to interpret them not literally, but in that sense, slurs directed at people and governmental bodies for whom you have a great deal of contempt.

Sound about right? Why not say so? I mean, I’ve heard Robert described as a “fucking asshole” before, and, not knowing much about his sex life, and being certain that he isn’t the anus of another living being, I assume that this is a coarse slur, and nothing more.

Doesn’t change the fact that your choice of words is very insensitive, and I think, ultimately fails to help accomplish your goals.

I suppose one could argue that all the fucking assholes around could be offended by the casual use of the term to describe Robert, but they’re fucking assholes. So who cares what they think?

by RazerRay

Monday Dec 10th, 2012 10:06 AM

beitar_youth_with_jabotinsky.jpg
beitar_youth_with_jabotin…

Image: Beitar Jewish Fascist Youth With Nazi collaborator and prominent Zionist Ze’ev Jabotinsky

I’m a Jew, and your “soldier” schtick doesn’t impress me as relevant, and I DO understand the semantics of Colby and Norse’ usage of the term.

Scale notwithstanding within American society (and it only took how many years for the Nazis to rise to power?), your version of Nazis (a term I object to mostly because it’s fixed in time with images frozen to match) and your Holocaust stopped at WWII. Because you’re the typical American Jewish narcissistic sociopath with an agenda of remembering the past but NOT looking at the presence of Fascism and authoritarian totalitarianism in modern society.

Why just last night I saw a flock of 5 or 6 cops, including Brass… The same ones I saw Robert badgering earlier in front of Forever21 (a sweatshop operation with factories in the US employing US citizens) stand for over an hour in front of PacificWave doing nothing and watching all the cars NOT STOP at the stop sign at Cooper & Pacific without hailing a single one down and THEN they swarmed a car that DID stop, that had music playing not loudly at all and a window open. They were swarmed like wanted criminals because they had music playing in their car that could be heard outside the car. Again, not loudly… . OF COURSE there were CHICANOS in the car.

Bet you didn’t know Chicanos are one ‘tribe’ of the New Jews being singled out for scapegoating in Rich White Santa Cruz’ SHOPPING MALL along with the houseless, and anyone deemed by APPEARANCE to be “Not Shopping”.

by RazerRay

Monday Dec 10th, 2012 12:51 PM

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Image: What Good is a Pig: Cuts of Pork, Nose-to-Tail
http://sugarmtnfarm.com/2012/05/03/what-good-is-a-pig-cuts-of-pork-nose-to-tail/

Nazi… I mean it literally as in “American Nazi”.

Here’s what happens when they get a grip on your society:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/greece/9330223/Rise-of-neo-Nazi-Golden-Dawn-party-leads-to-spate-of-immigrant-attacks-in-Greece.html

Did you know that it’s said 50% of the Greek Police voted for the Fascist Party in this last election?

Here’s a Straight Press attempt to debunk the story that fails to prove it’s point that, in large numbers, Police DON’T Luv Fascists: http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2012/06/are-greek-policemen-really-voting-in-droves-for-greeces-neo-nazi-party/258767/

The American ‘Bastion of Democracy” is quite the same

But I don’t call them Fascists. Like “Pig” it just reinforces their machismo self-image.

I prefer to call them Fascia… as in something with Fascist symbolism made from FAGGOTS of wood.

It’s interesting to note that the underpaid and certainly under-trained False Alarm people the city has patrolling and observing the xmas shoppers in the evening are having to bear the brunt of the blowback from a VERY HOSTILE COMMUNITY. Many of the people I know are beginning to resist the illegitimate citations being handed out like so many Fascist Xmas cards to non-shoppers on Pacific.

..and the next time that over-age overweight Fascist patrolling the library on Weekdays glares at me while I’m working at my computer at the library there WILL BE a disturbance when I ask the librarian to get him to stop staring or leave. Besides he smells bad… Like “Bacon” crisping.

by Observant

Monday Dec 10th, 2012 3:58 PM

You’re doing exactly the same thing as the others, Ray. Golden Dawn and fascist sympathizers in the Greek Police force do not implicate anyone in Santa Cruz of anything.

And that Worst Alarm guy can stand there and stare at you all day if he likes. For all I know, he can videotape you too. That’s how this works. The problem is that you like these freedoms until someone exercises them in a way you don’t like.

That, I believe, is at the heart of authoritarianism. No?

by RazerRay

Monday Dec 10th, 2012 9:46 PM

“And that Worst Alarm guy can stand there and stare at you all day if he likes.”

No he can’t. Do it to a woman and you’d be charged with stalking anywhere in Santa Cruz and the same applies to males staring at males. The fuckwad already called the police twice on me for no reason whatsoever and two times the police and I came to the conclusion I wasn’t doing anything at all and left.

Third time’s a charm. I figure a faceful of oven cleaner might keep him there until the police and ambulance arrive. Stalking is a SERIOUS crime where the right to self defense is known to be perfectly rationale and appropriate.

We can let the courts figure it out considering I have good record of the first two contacts and a recording of my conversation with them about his abuse of authority, and False alarm’s going to have to find another Fascist wannabe to patrol for them. Because THAT guy is going to need a seeing eye dog.

“You’re doing exactly the same thing as the others, Ray. Golden Dawn and fascist sympathizers in the Greek Police force do not implicate anyone in Santa Cruz of anything.”

You just… aren’t… living… up to you nick bud.

Pay attention. The people who are experiencing it say it is, and in MY case with stories from pre-war Europe my grandparents and relatives told me still like yesterday in my ears, to me, you have no credibility whatsoever to say it doesn’t implicate out local fascia (faggots of wood turned to fascist symbols).

You say “Nada” and I say “Nazi” with great misgivings (albeit the owner of Morris Abrams who outed the “Code Blue” goons would perhaps not be so kind) preferring the word FASCIST.

Historically, as far as the end results to the victimized, there’s really precious little difference.

My grandparents… chased across Central Asia to the Baltic and then to Europe by the pogroms never used the word ‘holocaust’ either. It was just another mass pogrom, much like the pogrom against the state of California’s displaced workers, and Santa Cruz’ city government and it’s armed faggots (pieces of wood turned to fascist symbols) are certainly in the cohort of agencies statewide involved in harassment and selective enforcement in a major way.

If you die in the cold because you can’t find shelter from the wind and rain due to police ticketing of you every time you sit somewhere out of the weather but ‘private’… or thugged by some overamped on anti-homeless propaganda kid (The Santa Cruz Sentinel needs to be burned to the ground ASAP) with no future blaming it on YOU because they see you as a threat to their survival as I was a month or so ago, that’s BLACKSHIRTING, and the people responsible for CREATING THAT CIRCUMSTANCE locally NEED TO BE HELD ACCOUNTABLE.

FWIW, after being jumped by three kids while I slept last month, the police officer DID NOT WANT TO let me file a complaint. When I INSISTED. He wrote up an attack by three people on a sleeping victim as “Misdemeanor Battery” instead of a felony.

That way not only don’t they have to investigate, but it doesn’t show on their statistics that the Houseless are subject to extreme violence else the STATE might investigate…

I call “Coverup”.

You aren’t only un-observant bud… You’re out of the loop.

Oh… and I’m NOT “You guys”. I have nothing whatsoever to do with any of the other posters here. And I stick by that “American Jewish narcissistic sociopath” statement whether or not your insignificant self approves

by RazerRay

Tuesday Dec 11th, 2012 6:21 PM

Copy the following to embed the movie into another web page:

download video: your_fascist_superhero_-_nuisance_laws.mp4 (27.3MB)

“Your Fascist Superhero”. A ten minute presentation by Superman and Batman in the left dialectic about how “nuisance laws”, and Santa Cruz LIVES FOR nuisance laws, only serve to further two interests.

Namely the police-industrial complex of the city and, of course, the Commercial Property Interests.

Good viewing and the dialectic is kept simple enough for even a Fascist to understand.

by Watcher

Wednesday Dec 12th, 2012 7:58 AM

“FWIW, after being jumped by three kids while I slept last month, the police officer DID NOT WANT TO let me file a complaint. When I INSISTED. He wrote up an attack by three people on a sleeping victim as “Misdemeanor Battery” instead of a felony.”

Wait a minute. You’re telling me that after all your railing against the Police State and against the SCPD for being fascists, Nazis and who knows what else, that you are now upset that they didn’t respond forcefully enough when you needed them for law enforcement on your behalf?

Are you serious? Really?

by Observing

Wednesday Dec 12th, 2012 10:44 AM

So, because Ray is a critic of the local police, he should not be able to call them for service?

He should not expect the police to treat his complaint the same as others who have called them?

Should the SCPD check Indybay first to see who they should respond to for service calls?

Should we all, who don’t pass their ‘smell test’, shut up and never call the police?

We should let the SCPD do all the thinking and all the decision making?

Thank you for making the case that we are living under Nazism here in downtown Santa Cruz.

by RazerRay

Wednesday Dec 12th, 2012 12:13 PM

…Against Nazi police. You read me call them, in so many words, “tools of Fascists”, and I suggest IF the police ACTUALLY DID THEIR JOB protecting EVERY citizen of the community with equal vigor they’d be doing something VERY DIFFERENT than what they’re doing now.

What? Did yo think I was some sort of Nihilist Anarchist or somesuch Troll-like delusion?

Sorry to disappoint you.

BTW, had a discussion with someone wearing “Brass” yesterday. Told me indirectly to demand more services. I refused a trip to the hospital for the bloody nose and blacked eye. THAT made the misdemeanor/felony difference.

by RazerRay

Wednesday Dec 12th, 2012 12:29 PM

The reason I didn’t take the ambulance trip.. In order of Importance.

10> I’m tougher than the backstop at a shooting gallery. ie. I wasn’t dying.

1> If I took that trip, my possessions… My sleeping bag, my clothing, my bike etc, would have been left at the scene and most likely be stolen, or confiscated by the city with a recovery time…. unknown.

…and we’re back to some thorny issues regarding certain problems unique to displaced workers and the homeless in general aren’t we?

It’s incredibly hard to get ‘justice’ EVEN IF the PD is compliant… when you’re a law abiding citizen but have no domicile.

by Watcher

Wednesday Dec 12th, 2012 12:55 PM

To call Ray a critic of the Santa Cruz PD is like calling Adolf Hitler a critic of the Jews. The only thing keeping the police alive in Ray’s presence is the fact that they’re armed with guns and Ray only has oven cleaner in his backpack.

It’s just very hypocritical to spew that much invective against a governmental body and then cry Uncle when miscreants wake you up sleeping outdoors..

Mind you, the cops didn’t even ticket Ray for sleeping outdoors. Which is a big part of the Santa-Cruz-is-a-police-state argument, right?

by FD

Wednesday Dec 12th, 2012 1:19 PM

…in Fresno, Ray would be an endangered species. After that threat he posted, to blind someone with that oven cleaner, the first time he approached anyone who was armed, with can in hand, the last sound he’d hear would be a gun going off. Making threats, even on line, can have dire consequences.

by Watching

Wednesday Dec 12th, 2012 1:42 PM

“Mind you, the cops didn’t even ticket Ray for sleeping outdoors. Which is a big part of the Santa-Cruz-is-a-police-state argument, right?”

So the SCPD, after not taking his complaint of abuse seriously, should have ticketed Ray for telling them that he was sleeping, even though they did not themselves find him asleep?

I wonder what you think should happen to a homeless woman who calls the SCPD after being raped while sleeping “illegally” ? I guess if that ever happens, she should feel lucky if she doesn’t get a ticket? Would this encourage or discourage those who are vulnerable and at risk to call the police after a violent attack? Which should be the SCPD’s priority, addressing violence, or addressing people who are sleeping?

You, sir or madame, are the voice of fascism that fuels the SCPD and the local police state, one that discriminates against the homeless.

“To call Ray a critic of the Santa Cruz PD is like calling Adolf Hitler a critic of the Jews.”

Ever heard of poetics? Ray uses a lot of it.

I’d also like to remind everyone that Ray has self-identified as having a personal link to Judaism, which further adds context to Watcher’s comments, and the Hitler reference.

by John E. Colby

Wednesday Dec 12th, 2012 4:22 PM

Ray’s arguments prevailed. The video he presented was excellent. I wish this obsessive poster would just accept it and stop posting personal diatribes.

by Robert Norse

Wednesday Dec 12th, 2012 10:44 PM

For those interested in the selective and arbitrary use of the Downtown Ordinances, the Sleeping Ban, and other anti-homeless laws, hear first hand-accounts tomorrow night on my show 6-8 PM 101.3 FM, streaming at http://tunein.com/radio/FRSC-s47254/. The proposed California Homeless Bill of Rights proposes to combat these abuses or discourage them: see http://wraphome.org/?p=2831&option=com_wordpress&Itemid=119.

Arguing with folks who wish to dismiss or minimize the escalating abuses and violence against homeless people–institutionalized in the curfews, police sweeps, modified library rules, and “quality of life” laws–is really a waste of time.

The real issue is how do we mobilize to expose, resist, and discourage this kind of hate crime.

I encourage people to keep a close eye on the library and report on how librarians (and their security guard pals) are treating homeless-looking folks there. Please be accurate and specific in your reports. Time, place, specific names, details, etc.

by RazerRay

Thursday Dec 13th, 2012 8:34 AM

I don’t have oven cleaner in my backpack. I don”t need it. I’m more than physically and technically capable of disarming and manually restraining any False Alarm guard I’ve met if necessary when I’m not sleeping, and I don’t own a backpack.

by Observer

Thursday Dec 13th, 2012 9:07 AM

“Arguing with folks who wish to dismiss or minimize the escalating abuses and violence against homeless people–institutionalized in the curfews, police sweeps, modified library rules, and “quality of life” laws–is really a waste of time. ”

Yes, and preaching to the choir is far more productive…

Sorry, but not letting people use the library as a dorm doesn’t quite rise to the level of ‘hate crime’, even in a hyperbolic world.

by RazerRay

Thursday Dec 13th, 2012 9:30 AM

dgr_-_which_side_are_you_on.jpg
dgr_-_which_side_are_you_…

NOT whether someone is committing some institutional administrative infraction but Where’s the INSTITUTIONAL RECOURSE if one IS accused of using the library as a “Dorm” or someone says they “Smell”.

As I stated earlier, the over-aged security guard who saunters around the library grounds on weekdays like he owns the place and DIRECTLY INTERFERES BY HIS OVERBEARING AND UP-CLOSE PRESENCE with MY PRIVATE CONVERSATIONAL RIGHT TO PRIVACY while sucking the taxpayer’s teat for a paycheck and calls the police for illegitimate reasons (as the police verified for me in a recorded conversation) smells like cooking Pig, and that odor is offensive to vegetarians… housed or allegedly “Dorming” at the library.

by G

Thursday Dec 13th, 2012 5:12 PM

Interesting statistic…

Number of comments about napping = a pile
Number of comments about desal spending = a few

Does anyone know the desal:library cost ratio, offhand? Just curious.

by RazerRay

Thursday Dec 13th, 2012 9:10 PM

I was going to point to this post: http://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2012/11/27/18726550.php Where I had commented that the Desal project is a taxpayers giveaway to a specific very powerful business group in Santa Cruz county, the Agriculture industry, by subsidizing their water to grow two of the most water-intensive crops in the world… Strawberries and Lettuce, in a region that just doesn’t have a lot of water to start with, but the comment has been, as is usual on indybay, mysteriously removed within the last month or so.

That may be your ratio issue. Someone removed comments.. Funny. Yours (G) is still there

by Memory

Friday Dec 14th, 2012 10:39 AM

Are you sure your comment was deleted, Ray?

This is a comment you made on a different article, and it sounds like the one you are talking about:

http://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2012/11/24/18726362.php?show_comments=1#18726391

by RazerRay

Friday Dec 14th, 2012 11:53 AM

After a while where I posted what becomes a blur.

by G

Friday Dec 14th, 2012 3:38 PM

I was wondering what the ratio is because observant people seemed to be posting a lot about napping and nothing at all about desal. It felt kind of inverse, dollar-wise, but I wasn’t sure, hence the question.

Then again, maybe there were observant posts about desal, that were removed by the mysterious powers that indy (I’ve always asserted moderation corrupts, any moderation).

by Robert Norse

Tuesday Dec 18th, 2012 3:58 AM

The Public Records Act sent to head librarian T. Landers is now 14 days old and unanswered. State law requires a response within 10 days. I’ll be seeking legal advice on how to encourage Landers, a big fan of rules for the poor in the library, to follow state law herself.

For a copy of the request see http://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2012/11/30/18726836.php?show_comments=1#18727166 above.

If anyone has gotten a complete copy of the library rules, please post them here, so we can all be good law-abiding folks. And perhaps serve as a shining example to the privileged rulesmaker T. Landers.

by John E. Colby

Tuesday Dec 18th, 2012 5:47 AM

From my memory of your public records request to Ms. Landers, you would have a slam dunk case if you choose to spend $500-$1000 to take her agency to court and your lawyer’s fees would be paid by her agency in case you prevail. I see no way she can argue the records you seek are exempt. Consult a FOI attorney.

What better agency to force transparency on than a library!

by RazerRay

Wednesday Dec 19th, 2012 6:53 PM

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[Image: Seen @ Santa Cruz City Hall]

Let’s get to the roots toots… Ms Landers IS NOT the person driving the policy changes. She’s just the manager-in-the-middle and albeit the appropriate person to go to for information and documentation, those changes are driven by political demands responding to sociological issues essentially set in motion by the city of Santa Cruz’ failure to develop a viable community for EVERYONE who lives here. To the best of their ability.

The library gets the ‘fallout’ from the city’s “Nuclear” policies about their displaced workers and other low income Santa Cruz residents. Poor people go to libraries when there’s nothing else to do or anywhere else to go.

I call “Nuclear Option” too. Fuck FOIA & Library… RICO Act & City of Santa Cruz… drag their influence over an allegedly independent library board into court and subpoena the dox.

Just sayin’

by G

Thursday Dec 20th, 2012 4:29 AM

#MoreForensicAccountingPlease

by RazerRay

Thursday Dec 20th, 2012 7:37 AM

teutonx.jpg
teutonx.jpg

…and I DO NOT mean that in jest, and you, as “Taxpayer” SHOULD be concerned.

Read the last post I put up troll. The answer to WHY it’s RICO Act is right in there.

The city of Santa Cruz HAS SOCIOECONOMICALLY OVER THE LAST DECADE and a half INTENTIONALLY created the socioeconomic circumstances that, BY THEIR OWN FOOLISH GREEDY PLANNING, caused the “Mess” at the library.

Then they VILIFY THE VICTIMS OF THEIR POLICIES.

Got that fool? I’m calling you “Fool” because that’s obviously the median intelligence level for a ‘taxpayer’ in Santa Cruz who would have allowed them to do that to the disadvantage of ALL citizens here except the wealthy… Or maybe you’re just greedy, and vicious, and an unwitting tool of American Fascists who call themselves Santa Cruz “progressive liberal” ‘government.

There’s a RICO Act indictment or a dozen somewhere within that decade and a half… Gaa…run…teed. To bad the ACLU here is nothing more than a fan club.

The state or federal government could EASILY tear this city’s government apart just as surely as they tore the SCPD apart three decades ago, and Santa Cruz citizens would ALL benefit from that.

by RazerRay

Thursday Dec 20th, 2012 7:48 AM

Sigh… “Taxpayer”‘s post went away. Maybe just as well to leave the response as an addendum to what I had posted last

by John E. Colby

Friday Dec 21st, 2012 5:35 PM

“The state or federal government could EASILY tear this city’s government apart just as surely as they tore the SCPD apart three decades ago, and Santa Cruz citizens would ALL benefit from that.”

Only the Feds can clean up this dirty little city now. All the local checks and balances have failed.