[Peace-discuss] Re: [Discuss] more than a nuisance

Wed Feb 11 00:03:02 CST 2009

Dear Ricky,

You are welcome and encouraged to always always speak your mind on
these and other lists.  I sure hope we always support an environment
of discussion.

...

I am having a hard time connecting your story to the proposed nuisance
ordinance.

A few years back the city instituted a rental registration program
which funds inspectors to make sure buildings are up to code (doors
work, windows lock, trash is removed, etc) and provides penalties to
landlords who have unsafe properties.  That solves problem #1 you
mention - unsafe properties.

As for problem #2 you mention - criminal behavior in your apartment
complex or neighborhood ...

I don't think you can compare Urbana, where the cops come when you
call them, to the urban cities where you worked with Acorn, where
neighbors would call the police and they wouldn't come.  Much of the
story you tell about crime I assume derives from this problem.

We have a criminal justice system which arrests and often convicts
people who have committed crimes against and within their
neighborhoods.  That system has a strong due process element to
protect the innocent.

So with the cops showing up, and a criminal justice system in place,
#2 problem is addressed.

My question throughout this discussion has been:

What problem is this nuisance ordinance solving?

For those who think that the current criminal justice system is too
lax and makes is easy for criminals to continue to operate in their
neighborhoods, then you would want to support the nuisance ordinance,
which significantly lowers the bar for considering someone guilty of
an offense.  The punishment could be as severe as that they, their
families, their children, and perhaps all their neighbors, will be
forced out of their housing.  If you want to kill a fly with a bomb,
then this is the correct methodology.

If this was only about penalizing bad landlords, then there would be
no provision for forced evictions or the shutting down of properties.

I will end with this chilling story:

A few years back Gabe O. of Gabe's Place wanted to get a tenant out
that he couldn't seem to evict through the current legal channels.  So
he invited the city to condemn the entire property, which they did
based on code violations caused by Gabe not keeping his place up.  ALL
the residents had to relocate and the property shut down.  Gabe,
happy, then fixed the property, re-tenanted the building, and
continued on with his business.  The landlord and the city conspired
to upset the lives of many innocent families.  The had to find new
housing in the middle of the year (near impossible in this town).
They may have had to switch the schools their children were in.  They
may have lost easy bus access.

So when the city says this won't happen, the fact is it already HAS.

- Danielle

On Tue, Feb 10, 2009 at 9:57 PM, Ricky Baldwin <baldwinricky at yahoo.com> wrote:
> My opinion may not be popular on either of these lists, but I think I ought
> to explain where I'm coming from.
>
> In the nineties I worked for ACORN - an association I was never prouder of
> than in this last election.  As a lone NYC Council member once said in
> another context - about not so different attacks on poor people organizing
> for their rights to vote, to improve their communities, to live in decent
> housing and safe neighborhoods, attacks by people who oppose all those
> things - "It is a badge of honor!"
>
> When I was at ACORN I spent my days and evenings six days a week walking
> around in the poorest, most dangerous (a.k.a. "worst") neighborhoods in the
> cities where I worked, talking to people who lived in toxic environments.
> There were many rats, and in Buffalo skunks, garbage in the streets not
> swept by the city, abandoned buildings, vacant lots.  When it rained water
> cascaded down the walls of the living rooms and kitchens where we sat and
> talked and they offered me orange juice and tried to figure out why I wasn't
> married and we planned the next meeting and how to get the press interested
> and which local preachers might help and which might get in the way, which
> cops were honest and which were dangerous criminals.  Front doors of
> apartment buildings didn't lock or had been broken for months.  Some people
> were afraid to go out into the hallways in their own building because of the
> violence and violent people going in and out, or living next door, down the
> hall, just up stairs.
>
> These were hazards, nightmares, not mere "nuisances".
>
> Landlord after landlord refused to fix anything, get rid of any dangerous
> tenants haunting the buildings, or take any responsibility at all.  People
> in these communities were trapped.  They lived there because they had few
> options, and there was very little recourse.  We organized together and
> fought the landlords, pressured city government to hold them accountable,
> and demanded that the landlords and the local government take some
> responsibility for the neglect and toxicity of those neighborhoods.  It was
> always an uphill climb, because money and influence and property rights were
> always on the other side.
>
> We won some, one piece at a time, but in truth we lost more often.  I think
> a lot of us know that song.  Even the victories were often mixed bags, but
> we improved real lives.
>
> I do have concerns about the proposed "Nuisance Ordinance" - some along the
> lines I think expressed by Charlie Smyth - and I'd like to see a more
> community-based, even complaint-driven system, rather than reliance on the
> police - but overall I support this effort.  I hope I've explained why.
>
> I continue to support efforts to expose and address police racial profiling
> and other abuses of power.  I still hope we as a community can strengthen
> the police review board some day soon.  But I do not see this ordinance as
> repressive on its face, but potentially very progressive.
>
> In Solidarity,
> Ricky
>
> "Speak your mind even if your voice shakes." - Maggie Kuhn
>
>
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