San Francisco, long thought of as a city with a liberal bent, has come up with a way to punish homeless people, but only during the hours of 7 a.m. through 11 p.m. After darkness falls, and no one can see them, the homeless can sit, sprawl, or stand on their heads without fear of being rousted. But for 16 hours, anyone, and that is thought to mean the homeless, who dares to sit on a curb, or lie down in a park, is subject to be cited by San Francisco police officers, whom the city apparently believes do not have bigger “crimes” to fight. The new law has the backing of the Mayor, and Lt. Governor-elect.
The San Francisco police department did not ask for this new assignment. San Franciscans did, when 53 percent of them voted on November 2 to make it a crime to stop and rest in their beloved city. The police will only be called when they receive complaints. The complaints might come from people drinking at their favorite bar, or sitting and enjoying a meal at an outdoor café. Or perhaps by someone driving by in a luxury car who spies someone who doesn’t look as if they have money. It is safe to say that a customer from one of the business establishments could probably get away with sitting down for a rest, providing they looked as if they “belonged” there, by grasping on to a shopping bag with a pricey store’s logo on it.
The good citizens of San Francisco apparently didn’t think this new law through. People who are homeless usually do not have money. Citing a homeless person two or more times will result in fines of $500 each time. Since the homeless person ,in most cases, will not be able to afford the fine, he or she will be sent to jail. A recent video posted on www.reentrycentral.org about the reemergence of debtors’ prisons. showed a Rhode Island man who couldn’t pay a $745 fine and was thrown in jail for 40 days, costing the taxpayers $4,000. California is facing a huge budget crisis as it is. Prisons and jails in California are so overcrowded that law suits have been threatened. A reasonable person might ask, “What were these voters thinking?”
Lest it be said that the voters of the City by the Bay are virulently anti-homeless, they would probably want it to be known that it is not only the homeless that they do not want sitting, sleeping and perhaps breathing their air. No, they do not want hippies to befoul the area around Haight-Ashbury. Apparently irony is not dead, because it was the hippies who made Haight-Ashbury world famous, and allowed clothing stores to charge outrageously high prices to tourists for “Genuine Hippie” clothing.
The voters have spoken. The dreaded hippies and homeless must not sit or lie down within the city’s confines. Instead of San Franciscans rallying to find homes and jobs for the less fortunate, the poor are ostracized and punished. Perhaps Tony Bennett could change the lyrics to the song that romanticized San Francisco. He could sing, “I left my heart in San Francisco… and the voters stomped it to pieces.”
Source: Change.org 11/4/10
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