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Venice Paper |
NIMBYism
by Patrick Meighan
"So call us NIMBY's, but until
you've lived here in our shoes, you might consider what labels
you try to stick on people."
I, personally, *do* live here, in your shoes, and I call you
NIMBYs. What street do you live on, Ty? I, myself, live on
Flower Ave. (where the homeless service center is going in),
just 4 doors down from the intersection of Flower and Lincoln.
I live here with my wife and my two-year-old daughter. And,
yeah, there are plenty of homeless people in this
neighborhood, which is *why* the homeless service center
should go in here. You can't treat the homeless people where
they aren't (like Lompoc or Lancaster). And, this being
America, you can't involuntarily ship the homeless people from
where they are to where you *wish* they were. You gotta treat
the homeless people where they are. For better or for worse,
Ty, our neighborhood is where they are.
I give you and your cohorts a great deal of credit for doing
the hard work of community organizing. That's no easy feat.
But at the end of the day, that organizing has had the net
effect of scapegoating the weakest and most voiceless among
us... those without homes, many of whom are mentally ill, have
substance abuse issues, and are veterans.
Quite frankly, if my family had
wanted to live in a community of NIMBY buckpassers, we'd live
in Brentwood. But we live in Venice, we're proud of Venice's
tradition of tolerance and compassion, and in keeping with
that tradition we welcome the St. Joseph's Homeless Service
Center to our neighborhood, right here on our own block.
(A comment from
LAvoice.org)
©
Patrick Meighan
Venice, CA
Class Action Suit Settlement Helps
Homeless!
Carol Sobel,
Pres. of the Los Angeles National Lawyer's Guild, settled a
class action lawsuit in favor of Venice homeless whose property
was seized by the Los Angeles Police and other L.A. City
employees, without warrant, and then destroyed during a homeless
sweep that took place back in September 2004 - just before Labor
Day. Sobel waived her legal fees, increasing the total cash
settlement available to homeless people, and the cash was
dispersed the first week of February 2007!
The case, Noe v. the City of Los Angeles, was partly based on
written and video-taped statements from people affected by the
sweep along with videotape and still picture evidence of ten or
more dumpsters full of the homeless people's belongings found in
Westchester (three towns south of Venice), documented by Calvin
E Moss and Peggy Lee Kennedy of Venice Food Not Bombs and the
Venice Justice Committee.
Also, and very significantly, Attorney Carol Sobel cared enough
to follow through with a lawsuit providing cash to Venice
homeless people, which helped move some into housing situations
and improved their living conditions.
The settlement further included an order regarding removal of
property if not abandoned and property must now be held for
ninety days. Common sense, the constitution, and the State of
California seem to all say we are supposed to be protected from
the police seizing our property without a warrant or probable
cause.
Legally and morally, police should not seize and destroy
property in order to rid an area of it's homeless population.
Such is the situation, though, in Venice Beach, California.
© Justice Committee
Across the U.S., public parks
are landing private operators -
New York's Bryant Park runs on
commercial support. Critics warn the concept could
disenfranchise the poor. By
Robert Lee Hotz
NEW YORK -
On any sunny day, thousands flock to
Manhattan's Bryant Park, lured by the shaded flower beds, the
carousel, the free wireless Internet and the hundreds of
comfortable cafe chairs all painted the same soothing shade of
ivy green. Not even the cold can keep them away. Since October,
148,000 people have visited the seven-acre city park to skate
"for free” on what many consider New York's finest outdoor
public ice rink. To some, Bryant Park is a vibrant town square.
Others argue it is merely a frame for product placements.
Supported entirely by commercial sponsors and fees, Bryant Park
is an ambitious experiment in the private operation of public
places, one that is being watched by urban planners and city
managers worldwide.
The survival of urban parkland
across the country depends heavily on private largesse. Parks in
Atlanta, St. Louis and Boston are managed by nonprofit
foundations. In San Diego, officials are considering a private
conservancy to refurbish Balboa Park. Nonprofit groups may help
manage aspects of the $2-billion restoration of the Los Angeles
River.
On Wednesday, President Bush announced plans to seek $1 billion
in private donations to spruce up the nation's 390 federal parks
and monuments.
Most of the 1,400-acre Presidio in San Francisco already is
managed by a nonprofit trust rather than directly by the
National Park Service. The contract requires it to be
self-supporting within five years.
Influence of the wealthy
But in New York, a city squeezed for open space, some activists
worry that the public parks are becoming too private. They say
wealthy donors may have influence over who gets access to park
facilities, and efforts to make parks self-supporting can turn
them into commercial developments. Civil libertarians worry
that parks ”New York's most democratic places” are becoming
fiefs where political gatherings are discouraged.
Corporate donations, concession fees and funding plans linked to
commercial development are feeding New York's most expansive
park-building boom in decades.
Central Park ”which gets five times as many visitors as the
Grand Canyon every year” is the prototype. It is tended by a
private conservancy with a staff of 300, aided by 1,300
volunteers. Donors raised $300 million to refurbish its 843
acres, and contribute $23 million a year to pay for upkeep. With
all that renovation, park planners also built in a double
standard, activists say.
To protect the park's new grass, officials denied permits to
antiwar groups that wanted to use the 13-acre Great Lawn for
protests during the 2004 Republican National Convention,
prompting lawsuits and public hearings. The New York
Philharmonic and Metropolitan Opera, however, use the same space
for free summer concerts every year.
"If you walk south from Central
Park, every public park you encounter is under some form of
private management," said Christian DiPalermo, executive
director of New Yorkers for Parks, an independent citizens
watchdog group.
The trend began in the 1980s as a rescue effort, with
neighborhoods and business-improvement districts banding
together to save parks that were decaying from government
neglect.
More
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S O S - SAVE OUR SENIORS!
Did you know that there are senior citizens living
homeless on the streets of Venice Beach? Elderly people who are reduced
to sitting on benches ALL DAY and sleeping in alleys AT NIGHT?
As part of The Benefit Network's "People
In Need" PIN
program we are asking you to help us house a small group of homeless
seniors who are currently living on the street in Venice.
WE HAVE LOCATED A SMALL
RESIDENTIAL BUILDING IN VENICE WHERE WE CAN HOUSE EIGHT (8) OF OUR
HOMELESS SENIORS. WE NEED TO RAISE MONEY FOR FIRST AND LAST MONTH'S
RENT ($5000 TOTAL) BY MARCH 15, 2007
WILL YOU HELP?
Donate whatever you can afford but know
that it will go directly to securing the building that is so desperately
needed. If we do not come up with the funds by the middle of March we
will lose this opportunity.
PLEASE GIVE
GENEROUSLY!
Donating through this
website is
simple, fast and totally secure. It is also the most efficient way to
support our fundraising efforts.
Many thanks for your support -- and don't forget to forward this to
anyone who you think might want to donate too!
ALL DONATIONS ARE TAX DEDUCTIBLE
<*> <*>
<*> <*> <*> <*>
The Center offers help to more than 2,700 homeless men, women, and
children each year through street outreach, emergency services, crisis
intervention, case management and referrals. Our comprehensive programs
provide job training and placement, meals, and access to affordable
housing.
St. Joseph Center's
Homeless
Service Center has provided a compassionate response to the
needs of homeless individuals and families in Venice, Santa Monica and
other West Los Angeles communities since 1981. It is the hub of the
Center's efforts to help people get off the street into a safer and
healthier environment.
More
St. Joseph Center move to Lincoln Blvd.
opposed by some in neighborhood
by Vince Echavaria
As the St. Joseph Center plans to relocate a
homeless service center to a facility at Lincoln Boulevard and Flower
Avenue in Venice, some nearby residents and business owners are
objecting to the service center's move close to a residential
neighborhood. After operating its walk-in service center for 20 years at
a facility at Fourth Street and Rose Avenue in Venice, the St. Joseph
Center is moving the service center to the site of one of its former
thrift stores at 404 Lincoln Blvd. The move comes after St. Joseph
Center — a Venice-based organization that provides various services to
homeless and low-income people — lost its lease at the Rose Avenue
facility and was having to pay a sizable increase in rent to stay there,
said Rhonda Meister, St. Joseph Center executive director. "We're not
expanding or adding services, we're just relocating," Meister said.
"We would not have chosen to relocate, had we not lost our lease."
St. Joseph Center
officials say they hope to be able to open the center at its new
location by the beginning of March.
More © The Argonaut
<*>
<*> <*> <*> <*> <*>
Founded in 1987, Children Helping
Poor and Homeless People (CHPHP) is an educational outreach
program conducted by children and teens with adult advisors. CHPHP
is a department of Fellowship of Light which is a division of Nos Amis/Our
Friends, Inc., a 501 (C) 3 California nonprofit interfaith corporation.
 CHPHP
community service and service learning activities involve young people
and adults in direct hands-on projects which help children, women and
men in need in California, Oregon and expanding into Arizona. The goal
of CHPHP is to help end hunger, poverty and homelessness through
education. More
<*>
<*> <*> <*> <*> <*>
VCHC was founded by
community activists concerned about growing poverty and homelessness in
Venice, amid burgeoning affluence. The availability of affordable
housing was threatened by rapid gentrification, along with the wonderful
diversity that historically characterized Venice’s demography. Later,
responding to gang violence, VCHC expanded its mission to provide job
training and transitional employment for at-risk youth. Today, VCHC’s
programs also include social support services and an infant-toddler
program.
More specifically, VCHC is motivated by
the facts of life for all too many in the community it serves. Venice
Beach is the second-largest tourist attraction in California, bringing
millions of visitors to this eclectic and diverse segment of coastline
every year. It is also the site of several high-tech companies and many
high-rent condominiums. But its Oakwood neighborhood, while close to
this wealth on the map, remains untouched by these local dollars.
Several persistent problems have compounded in recent years and keep
families at a frustrating distance from long-term health and financial
stability:
More
LET'S TAKE A LEAF OUT OF NEW
YORK'S BOOK!
The Doe Fund is a hopeful
organization. One that unites rather than divides. One
that brings out the best in people -- not just the
formerly homeless men who pass through our Ready,
Willing & Able program, but all whose lives they
touch -- their own families and children, and all
community members who benefit from the difference they
are making in the quality of life in our city and the
monumental changes they are making in themselves. The men of Ready,
Willing & Able often come from very difficult
backgrounds. They are products of poverty, poor
education, alcoholism, drug addiction and families
broken in ways most of us cannot imagine. Despite all of this, they
come to us wanting to be productive and useful, wanting
to be an asset to their families, communities and city,
and wanting to share in both the benefits and
responsibilities of being an American. As you come to
know the individuals of Ready, Willing & Able,
you appreciate the heroic proportion of their struggle
to change and their profound gratitude for the
opportunity that this program provides - structured paid
work and collective caring. The men in blue take
pride in the work they do every day on our streets and
sidewalks. They are cleaning a city they once felt apart
from, but, now, consider their own. Their success is a
tribute, not only to their determination, but to the
enormous support and appreciation they receive from over
38,000 caring individuals who believe in them and in the
transformative power of work.
© George T. McDonald
The Tax Man Cometh, part two
by W. George E. K. French
Last month I explained how to stop money
from being taken out of your paycheck. Now, let's take a look at this
whole IRA thing from the bottom up.
The Federal Reserve Act
was put through Congress back in 1913. This happened at about eleven
thirty at night, on December Twenty Third. Why was Congress in session
two days before Christmas, a few minutes before midnight? The answer is
that a group of private banks spent enough money to make it happen. How
much that was, we will never know; but you can bet that it was huge. The
Federal Reserve Act gave these banks the right to distribute the money
printed and minted by our Mints to all the other banks in this country.
In return for this distribution, we were to be charged the face value of
that money, plus interest. In effect, this gave these private banks a
very profitable stranglehold on our monetary system. Why would any
Nation want to give a group of private bankers the right to distribute
their money, charge them the full face value of these bills and then
charge interest on top of that....just for distributing the money to
other banks? This is insanity, robbery, thievery and outright madness.
But these private banks managed to buy the votes that made it legal.
You've heard of words “National Debt” time and again. But were you told
that the National Debt is mainly the interest and the face value of the
money that our mints produced and that these banks “distributed?”
Remember last month I told it was a swindle? Well, this is only part of
it. They (the banks) also chartered a privately owned (by them)
corporation and called it “The Internal Revenue Service.”
Sound familiar? That's
right, it is still the same entity today, and these private banks still
own it. Oh, I'm sorry; you thought the Internal Revenue Service was
owned by our own government? Does the word “sucker” sound familiar, to
you? Yep! You've got it. Now, then! From a legal standpoint, the
“income tax” is voluntary. It doesn't match up with either of the two
forms of tax that our Constitution allows. Early IRS handbooks,
published for employees, stated that the tax was voluntary and also laid
out some ways of convincing people to pay it anyway. Guess what a
“1040” form really is. It's a trap! There is a law that says before a
“tax” can be levied, there must be, just like in real estate, an
“assessment.” This must be signed, under penalty of perjury, and
submitted to the Secretary of the Treasury.
Well, the 1040 firm
qualifies as a “self assessment.” Or, you might call it a confession of
what you owe the IRS. Either way, once you sign it and send it in, that
gives them the right to collect whatever you say you owe them, almost
any way at all. These institutions want to keep you in fear at all
times. Control is their goal; and every dime they can extort from you.
There are a couple of legalities you might think about. First is the
Fifth Amendment. It says that you aren't required to incriminate
yourself. Well, if you fill out that 1040 from the way they want you
to, you are doing exactly that. Second, every form letter or printed
matter of this nature must be checked over by the Office of Management
and Budget. The OMB assigns an “OMB” number to the form, with an
expiration date, both printed in the lower left hand corner. Any form
or letter without the OMB number and expiration date is rogue and has
no force or effect of law. Ignore any form or letter without an OMB
number. The IRS uses such forms and letters a lot. No IRS agent has
the legal right to assess a penalty or a fine on anyone without a trial,
verdict and court order. Agents frequently send out rogue letters
claiming that someone has been penalized or fined large amounts of
money. These rogue letters are never signed, only stamped with a
fictitious name. If an agent signed them, he or she could be fined and
and imprisoned, so they use an anonymous rubber stamp. They figure you
won't know the difference. Another ploy is to state that a person still
owes the IRS a small amount – thirty to fifty dollars, perhaps. Of
course, the letter has no OMB number, but if the recipient pays the
amount assessed, the IRS ups the ante and comes back for a few hundred
more. It's a con game. Most people think they owe when they get a
rogue letter saying they have been penalized $500.00 or so. They don't
know that no IRS agent has the right to impose a fine or impose a levy
or lien. A person must be sued in a court of law, lose the case, be
found guilty by a judge and jury; and there must be a court order before
any fine, levy or lien can be issued by the court.
If you ever get any
letter, or perhaps a computer printout without an OMB number, it's a
fishing expedition and you don't have to pay the amount required, or
even answer the letter. There's a lot more that you should know
about this stuff for your own protection from these blood-suckers.
Because I am not an attorney-at-law, I can't legally advise anyone what
to do. This doesn't mean that you can't read what I say and check it
out for yourself. Remember, attorneys, accountants, CPAs and so on are
all part of the scam, and they make lots of money from your ignorance.
Don't expect them to advise you. Go on the net and check out the
information there. More next time. Stay tuned. ©
W. George E. K. French |
JOIN
4-TIME GRAMMY AWARD WINNER
EDWIN HAWKINS
IN HIS APPEAL TO RAISE FUNDS
FOR AMERICA’S HOMELESS
Donate $10 online
and download a copy of Edwin Hawkins’ “People In
Need” (PIN) song
www.myspace.com/edwinhawkins
or send $15.00 check/money order
The Benefit
Network/PIN Fund
P O Box 1952
Venice CA 90294
 The Bible Tabernacle
Outreach to the poor and needy of the
community, in the way of food, clothing and household
items was from the beginning of their ministry. The
Bible Tabernacle started serving Christmas dinners in
1962 and Thanksgiving dinners in 1985. The tremendous
ministry of housing the needy was never imagined but
just grew from a few to a multitude:
"By our city
and community, we mean all those areas from which the
poor and needy come to us seeking help.
By love, we mean
that unconditional quality of feeling which causes one
to embrace the person regardless of the unloveliness of
the object --- seeing the need.
By compassion, we
mean that deep inner feeling of sympathy invoked by the
suffering seen in the physical, spiritual and emotional
lives of the poor and needy.
By refuge, we mean a
place of safety, rest, comfort and renewal. By healing,
we mean that result accomplished in the total person
through a deep personal relationship with the Lord Jesus
Christ.
By transformed life,
we mean that process of renewal which comes from a
change in thinking and attitude which results in the
submission to the will of God.
By empowering,
we mean that realization of the sufficiency of Christ in
every area and dimension of life."
More
Gov't estimates 754,000
homeless people
by Stephen Ohlemacher
WASHINGTON - The nation has three-quarters of a million
homeless people, filling emergency shelters through the
year and spilling into special seasonal shelters in the
coldest months, the government said Wednesday. The
Department of Housing and Urban Development estimated
there were 754,000 homeless people in 2005, including
those living in shelters, transitional housing and on
the street. That's about 300,000 more people than
available beds in shelters and transitional housing. The
report is the government's latest attempt to count
people who are notoriously difficult to track. The
estimate is similar to one by an advocacy group in
January. The 2000 Census pegged the number of
homeless people at 170,700, but it was widely considered
an undercount. In 1996, the Urban Institute used data
collected by the Census Bureau to estimate there were
between 640,000 and 840,000.
Housing officials hope the new report will serve as a
starting point to more accurately measure changes in the
homeless population. "Understanding homelessness is a
necessary step to ending it, especially for those
persons living with a chronic condition such as mental
illness, an addiction, or a physical disability,"
HUD Secretary Alphonso Jackson wrote in the report.
HUD developed the estimate using data collected by local
agencies that serve the homeless. Agencies across the
country tried to count the number of people living on
the street one night in January 2005. The agencies also
collected information about race, gender, and disability
status from people staying in emergency shelters and
transitional housing from February to April 2005.
Among the findings for people in shelters and
transitional housing:
_Nearly half were single adult men.
_Nearly a quarter were minors.
_Less than 2 percent were older than 65.
_About 59 percent were members of minority groups.
_About 45 percent were black.
_About a quarter had a disability, though experts said
the percentage is probably much higher.
The Urban Institute recently did a study on homeless
people in Santa Monica, Calif., and found only 6 percent
of those using services for the homeless did not have a
mental illness or a substance abuse problem, said Martha
Burt, a researcher at the institute. Emergency
shelters are more than 90 percent full on average
nights, the report said. They would be over capacity if
not for seasonal shelters. By comparison, less
than three-quarters of transitional housing units for
families are occupied on an average night. HUD has
been shifting resources from emergency shelters to
transitional and permanent housing for years. The number
of emergency shelter beds dropped by 35 percent from
1996 to 2005, to 217,900. Meanwhile, the number of
transitional housing beds increased by 38 percent during
the same period, to 220,400. The number of beds in
permanent supported housing increased by 83 percent, to
208,700. "We ought to be looking for ways to move
people from shelters into permanent housing," said Nan
Roman, president of the National Alliance to End
Homelessness.
"Building shelter beds doesn't result in these people
being housed," Roman said. "But clearly, short of
housing, everybody should have a roof over their head.
This points out that we are not there, either."
© Stephen Olhermacher
THIS IS WHAT
WE'RE UP AGAINST!
The Los Angeles Homeless
problem can be treated
by Crimefile
(found online - not very
nice!)
Los Angeles has a huge
problem with vagrants who are politely called homeless
people. For the most part they are illegal aliens, drug
addicts, violent criminals and the seriously mentally
disturbed. They also bring diseases like hepatitis and
tuberculosis to people they encounter. To deal with the
problem Los Angeles officials want to relocate this
blight to residential areas such as Venice. Aside from
creating severe economic damage to area property values
and destroying a neighborhood residents will have to
brace for an increase of every kind of crime. A simpler
and better solution is to deport the alien vagrants, and
relocate the rest of this human refuse to industrial
areas where the impact is minimal. There would also be
better access to jobs for those inclined to clean up and
help themselves. There is no reason to place this mess
into residential areas where families live. If the
Liberals really want to help the homeless, placing them
in residential neighborhoods is inviting hardship to
everyone involved. Put the vagrants somewhere where they
can be helped. Bring the social workers, medical
providers and rehabilitation services out to the
vagrants away from existing neighborhoods. Do it for the
children
More
A
Call for Compassion and Reason
by
Barbara Peck
Here, in Venice, we have a tradition of championing the
rights of poor people, as in 1965 when the City of Los
Angeles
tore
down one third of Venice's 1600 structures in an attempt
to get rid of the recalcitrant hippie population:
“They were stopped in court by
the NAACP and the Peace and Freedom
Party, who organized to protect the poor. The city's
dream of building high rise hotels and apartments like
Miami Beach was thwarted. Venice looked like it was
bombed during World War 2 as little was rebuilt during
the next decade.”
(Wikipedia)
And,
throughout the 70s, when the then Venice Town Council,
in direct contrast to our present Venice Neighborhood
Council: “felt
that the poor had just as much right to live in Venice
as the rich people who were buying property to develop.
They realized that rapidly rising property values were
on a collision course with the community's entrenched
low-income population. The Venice Town Council's goal
was to delay or at least scale down any project that
might affect surrounding property values and the rents
landlords charged.”
Then,
during the 80s and 90s: “low-income
housing advocates feared that the demise of
project-based Section 8 housing would be catastrophic.
L.A. had 30 landlords buy out of Section
8 mortgages.
‘Venice is one of the last
places in the country where low-income people can live
by the beach,’ said Larry Gross of the Coalition for
Economic Survival in
L.A.
‘We’re just barely holding on to HUD-assisted housing
there. But soon it will all be over and become condo
conversions. In general it’s a bleak picture. The
policies that have been enacted and the direction we’re
heading seem to spell disaster for low-income people.’
People displaced from public housing and Section 8 added
even more strain to the already tight affordable-housing
markets. And their displacement from gentrifiable areas
doubly helped the gentrifiers. Not only were Section 8
and public-housing units cleared for market rate units,
but the removal of the undesirable poor residents
instantly made the neighborhood ‘better’ and more
attractive to wealthy residents.”
(LIP Magazine)
In
keeping with its traditional compassionate values,
Venice has served its homeless citizens by means of a
variety of agencies and churches like St. Joseph’s
Center, Bible Tabernacle, Didi Hirsch and others over
the past 30 years or more. While some members of the
local residential community have made this possible,
NIMBY-ism (Not In My Back Yard) has prevailed and
services have been limited. Now, as the City of L.A.
moves forward with its plans to gentrify Venice, upscale
development is given the ‘green light’ by the
City-backed Venice Neighborhood Council, headed up by
Republican president, Dede Audet. Subsequently, the
homeless and St. Joseph’s center are being asked to
‘move on’ - in order to maintain the “integrity”
of the community while, at the same time, presumably,
allowing property prices (which have leveled off and may
be in decline) to stabilize.
A flyer
distributed by SONIC (Save Our Neighborhood’s Integrity
Committee) suggests that both St. Joseph’s Center and
their unfortunate clients be relocated to a “suitable
location in an industrial area” - thus, presumably,
solving the problem. In their flyer they also refer to:
“the recent proliferation of 7 medical marijuana stores,
2 methadone clinics, needle exchange, 3 notorious liquor
stores and chronic prostitution” as somehow
inextricably entwined with the new proposed St. Joseph’s
Drop-In Day center. Which leads me to believe that: a)
this SONIC group have a negative, dispassionate view of
their homeless brothers and sisters and b) are naïve to
believe that the problem can be dealt with somewhere
else.
As we
live in a predominantly Christian society, presided over
by the notorious ‘born-again Christian’, Bush, would it
not be more “Christian-like” to treat our homeless
citizens with greater compassion? ‘There, but for the
Grace of God go I?’ Rather than condemning our homeless
brothers and sisters to an industrial wasteland, would
it not be the ‘Christian’ thing-to-do to provide more
shelters and services in the very areas where they are
most needed? Venice is one such area. Owing to
exorbitant property and rental prices over the past
decade, poor people have been squeezed out of their
homes onto the streets. Not all the homeless in Venice
come from outside the area, many of them were housed
here until they could no longer afford the rents or
their building was sold out to condo-conversion.
I
advocate that we-the-people of Venice face the problem
head-on with reasonable and compassionate solutions
rather than segregation of the homeless populace. For
instance, an adequate homeless ‘shelter’ is long overdue
in our community. St. Josephs’ and the Bible Tabernacle
have valiantly carried on, all these years, providing
short-term ‘band-aid’ solutions to a long-term chronic
disease. NIMBY-ism has obstructed the development of a
more comprehensive, compassionate solution – hence we
have a build-up of chronic homeless cases that have
never received adequate treatment. Sending these cases
to a Drop-In Day Center in the middle of an industrial
park will not serve either the afflicted or the
affected.
Homelessness cannot be swept under the rug and made to
disappear. However much you may be repelled by those
unfortunates; and however much you tremble at the
thought of your property values plummeting; I recommend,
for the sake of your own ‘integrity’, that you find
compassion and empathy in your heart. Not all homeless
people are drug addicts, alcoholics, criminals or
prostitutes and it is unfair to dispose of them by
assuming that they are. The ‘Christian’ thing to do is
to strengthen your hearts and minds to the possibility
of integrating those less fortunate back into the fabric
of our society by embracing the problems with
compassionate solutions. ©
Barbara Peck
“There, but for the Grace of God, go I”
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One View From the
Boardwalk
by Therese Dietlin
Odds
and ends of interest:
1.
Presidents'
Day, 2007 – I am breaking down my (political) table on
the Boardwalk when two clean cut young men approach.
They show such keen interest in the material still on
display that we start talking. After a few opening
words, one of them says, “Don't shoot me, but we are
reporters from FOX News.” Do you find that comment
curious as I do? We have an extended conversation about
a number of items of current interest that finally ends
up with the terrorists. Here's who terrifies me:
people who give us the Patriot Act; who eliminate habeas
corpus; who operate concerns like Guantanamo and Abu
Greib, who lie us into dangerous, destructive and
murderous situations, then lie about lying about it.
Neither Osama bin Laden nor Saddam Hussein has done
these things. But our so-called representative
government has – and continues to. And so does FOX
News.
2.
There's a plan afoot
to organize a nation-wide boycott of corporate concerns from
April 15th through April 22nd. Frankly,
I think we should have begun the boycotting a long time ago
and the only time limits should be the arrest, trial and
conviction for treason of Bush, Cheney, the entire “executive”
branch of government, most of the Supreme Court, and quite a
few members of Congress. However, we begin where we are at
and so let us begin here. For more information, go to
www.impeachthepresidentnow.com. Or stop by my table just
north of Dudley on Sundays, as close to all day as possible.
3.
For weeks I
have been wondering where all the homeless people who
normally hang out in the Dudley Pagoda had gone. Few
were there, and only for short periods. Well, on the
first Sunday of March, a whole new crop had shown up –
young people with excess and unrestrained energy and no
self-discipline. What are our young people doing on the
streets and what are they being exposed to? Is this
Brazil? Why are they so hyperactive? What have we
done; what are we doing to our youth? Some I have
spoken with have either been forced out of their homes
by their parents, or left because they could not
tolerate circumstances there any longer. What is going
on and why is there no audible outcry about it? The
only sounds we have heard are mostly Jan Perry (9th
District) authorizing sweeps of downtown to clear it for
the developers lusting after what they consider
valuable property.
4.
Afternoon,
Sunday, March 3rd, Dr. John and other
musicians playing with Ibrahim Butler and others on
Ocean Front Walk at Dudley were arrested for violating
the noise ordinance. Some perceive this as another
attempt to destroy the ambiance of the Boardwalk, along
with all that entails. As one who has lived on an
underpopulated coastline along Lake Huron,where ready
access to the water was uncontested because there were
no people to object (no longer true), and on the East
Coast where access to the Atlantic Ocean was to be had
if you lived in the right community, owned property on
the ocean yourself, or traveled to the occasional state
park, I was particularly impressed with California's
commitment to keeping the ocean available to the public
domain. Only those who have experienced the
restrictions in other densely populated oceanfront
regions of the country can truly appreciate the treasure
that the state legislature reserved for the people. If
you don't know that this treasure is in imminent danger
of being taken away, you owe it to yourself and your
children to get informed and then take serious and
committed action. Don't expect city council or your
state assembly person to do it for you. You may have
cast your ballot for them, but the developers own their
vote. In the meantime, if you enjoy coming to the
Boardwalk and seeing the funky art, having your future
told or your palm read, listening to authentic original
musical performances while you sip a beer or enjoy
comestibles at the Bistro or the Candle Cafe, contact
the Pacific Division of LAPD and tell them you object to
the harassment of the people who bring you pleasure on
Saturday and Sunday on Ocean Front Walk. And harass
city council about the anti-First Amendment Permit
Lottery system that is undermining the essence of the
Boardwalk. Thank you.
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Deadline for each issue is 25th of the month.
Email
articles, poems, etc. in Word .doc format and
pictures/photos in .jpg format as attachments.
Thank you!
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