Readers interested in a facts and specifics can refer to two letters printed in the current issue of City on a Hill Press. I reprint them below. Stacy, like Fed Up, either didn't know the facts or apparently chose to ignore them.

The ordinance the police were violating was not "display of merchandise" (MC 5.43) it was "non-commercial use" (MC 9.50.020).

The sidewalk in front of Marini's is not Marini's property, it is public sidewalk. Municipal codes apply. Ms. Phelps is in error here as well.

The point is that police regularly and repeatedly harass poor people, activists, and musicians with these ordinances (which were written for that purpose--to give the police a blank check to move along people they and/or merchants don't like). Yet police don't even follow the laws they wrote and are charged with enforcing (the laws came out of the police department and the city manager's office).

Stacy Phelps is entitled to her opinion, of course, but one wonders if she is related to the SCPD Officer Phelps, who is part of Sgt. Loren "Butchie" Baker's team--the same team that harasses homeless people downtown with sickening regularity.

Yes, we were peaceful. But to put pressure on police for illegal behavior, in a town with a newspaper in the pocket of the cops, it's necessary to speak out directly--and with anger, if that's what the situation calls for. Anger, it would seem is okay for progressives fighting Proposition P, but not for those of us trying to stop police misconduct and discriminatory enforcement downtown.

It was interesting that many watching applauded when Officer Howes finally felt he had to close down his illegal table and removed it.


The first letter is from James Nay, one of those who asked the police to move their table (a few feet) to conform to the Downtown Ordinances.



November 5, 2002
Dear City on a Hill Press:

A few corrections on your ‘Police Tabling in Front of Marini’s’ story of last week. It made us look like soreheads spoiling a police candy giveaway to kids. Since police are making lots of use of the Downtown Ordinances to harass homeless people, I think it’s important to know just how free the police feel they are to ignore their own law, and then charge others with it. That was the point of our protest.
1. My name is James Nay, not James May.
2. I did not demand the police table be “closed down”. I only asked that police follow the law MC 5.43.020(1)a and move it 6’ from the entrance, as police require other (non-police) tablers to do. They refused.
3 . The police table was not “quickly closed down.” I argued with five officers for half an hour. After Robert Norse arrived and began loudly informing the growing crowd what was happening, Officer Howes folded up the table and left.
4. I do not believe a “citizen’s arrest” merely requires an officer to “write a report on the incident and file it with the D.A.’s office.” In a code section that follows on citizen’s arrests, PC 142a states: “Any peace officer who has the authority to receive or arrest a person charged with a criminal offense and willfully refuses to receive or arrest such person shall be punished by a fine not exceeding ten thousand dollars ($10,000), or by imprisonment in the state prison, or in a county jail
not exceeding one year, or by both such fine and imprisonment.”
The section requires the officer to at least write out a citation, which is then signed by the complaining party. It is a serious crime for police to refuse to issue such a citation. Police regularly allow respectable citizens to issue citations against “riff raff”, but apparently don’t like it when the tables are turned and they are on the business end of the ticket.
5. Officer Campbell’s claim that “there was no violation” because the “location of the table was not in the way” and “they had permission from Marini’s” is simply wrong. Merchants cannot give anyone permission to violate the Downtown Ordinances on the public sidewalk; whether it’s in the way or not is no defense. It certainly wasn’t when we set up our table in the same spot. By the way, we were giving out candy and badges too.
I think the Downtown Ordinances are stupid laws and very prone to selective enforcement as written. But police can’t even abide by their own law, nor are they held accountable when they break it. Are we living in a police state yet?
James Nay
The second letter I wrote:

Nov 4, 2002
Dear City on a Hill,

Glad that CHP is taking an interest in the selective enforcement of the anti-homeless ordinances downtown (“Protesters Say Police Violated Downtown Ordinance” by Hunter Holcombe, CHP 10-31). The Porter-Reilly city ordinances rushed through last summer with UCSC students on vacation and expanded police power to sweep poor, homeless, and young people from sidewalks. Sitting, sparechanging, street performing, and or political tabling on 95% of the sidewalks is now illegal and enforcement apparently is at merchant discresion.
But police behavior on October 28th and October 30th added a whole new dimension to “selective enforcement.” Downtown-For-All, a civil rights group fighting these laws, has received repeated complaints that police harass “riff-raff” for gathering near Costa Brava, musicians for standing anywhere near a building (even if they are following the Street Performers Guidelines), and homeless panhandlers for holding up silent signs near the Cinema 9 (that entire side of the street is largely ruled out for sitting or peaceful sparechanging by the poor).
Moreover more frequent police violence against skateboarders (October 20th in front of Starbucks) and other victimless crime arrestees has risen. Police surveillance of “Merry Mondays” (the Downtown-For-All weekly event that happens 4-6 p.m. at Cooper and Pacific reclaiming the sidewalks for all) was denounced by the Green Party at the Citizens Police Review Board on October 14th at hearings there. The harassment of copwatch advocates (like Steve Argue) continues unabated. Argue recently was dragged into court again on his fourth jaywalking, or “walking while Argue” ticket.
Those in the UCSC community fighting to restore civil rights should know that Councilmembers Kennedy,
Fitzmaurice, Rotkin, and Matthews have all supported the Downtown Ordinances--which have driven most musicians
from Pacific Avenue. City Council can be reached at 420-5017. Downtown-For-All’s phone line is 476-6112.

Robert Norse

We need more Copwatch volunteers--call 423-HUFF (4833). --RN