[Peace-discuss] Re: Nuisance Ordinance and Racism
E. Wayne Johnson
ewj at pigs.ag
Sun Jan 4 13:40:12 CST 2009
Did you ever get the power hooked back up to your garage?
Marti Wilkinson wrote:
>
> If we can get back to the original issue - there are different
> opinions on the proposed ordinance regarding property owners and the
> conduct of their tenants. My primary objection is due to how an
> ordinance like this can potentially be enforced.
>
> By that same token, I am not unsympathetic to property owners who live
> next door to individuals who engage in criminal conduct. My question
> here is what would the individual do if the neighbors happen to be
> homeowners? To me the question of how to deal with poor neighbors is
> one that can't always be addressed through the creation of laws.
>
> For example, when I bought my house in 1997 I came close to not making
> an offer on the house because the owners pulled a couple of stunts
> when I attempted to see the house. I wasn't able to get a good look at
> the backyard due to an oversize swimming pool. However, I was living
> in a place where the lease was going to expire and it was the best
> house I could afford at the time.
>
> When I moved in I had to cut down 5 foot high weeds that were spread
> across the back yard. Additionally I had to fill in the hole that had
> been left when the previous owners removed their swimming pool.
> Underneath the wood deck (which I later removed) was an exposed wire
> which connected the detached garage to the house. In order to
> alleviate the fire hazard I had to disconnect the power to my garage.
> In the process of moving the previous owners trashed the place, left a
> mess, and took off with the mailbox. Their daughter later came over
> and told me how embarrassed she was by the state of things.
>
> This is not all....a couple of my neighbors, who moved here from
> Germany, told me that they had been subject to verbal abuse and
> harassment by the previous owners. Another neighbor of mine, who is
> blind, received similar treatment. I've heard stories about drinking
> and loud fights and when I checked the circuit clerk site I found that
> members of the family have been on the receiving end of restraining
> orders. However, as homeowners, they were not subject to the types of
> nuisance laws that are being proposed against renters.
>
> At the time I bought the house the previous owners told me they were
> building a place out 'in the country' and, considering what I have
> heard, it may be that they just were not a good fit for living in a
> municipal community.
>
> Needless to say my neighbors were happy to see me move in:)
>
> Marti
>
>
>
> On Sun, Jan 4, 2009 at 9:38 AM, E. Wayne Johnson <ewj at pigs.ag
> <mailto:ewj at pigs.ag>> wrote:
>
> You certainly seem to be far more cynical and far more willing to
> settle for a lot less than I am,
> and certainly more willing to surrender your personal liberties to
> the (I'll say it again) iron thumb.
> I am surprised to find you and Ricky both defending the status quo
> in Urbana.It
>> Laurel, despite her privileged life, is surprisingly UNpompous
>> and UNarrogant.
> Really!!!!????? You've GOT to be kidding.
>
> She is the most pompous and arrogant person that I know and
> certainly one of the most pompous I have ever
> had the misfortune to have met. I dont know what draws a serpent
> like her into a backwater like Urbana.
> She is obviously someone "Not from around here".
>
> I perceive Laurel Lunt Prussing as a sort of post-modern Margaret
> Sanger, a campaigner, nay, a marauder
> for the superior blooded elite. She is one who perceives the
> inferior and now cowering unfortunate miserable unwashed
> under her purview as "human weeds". Since it is all So too damn
> late for her to have prevented their birth,
> she desires to call in and invalidate their franchise on life by
> what ever post-natal means are at her disposal. She is, as some
> others have observed, genuinely classist, and racist to the
> ribosome. But she covers for and disguises her
> inherent illiberality by various outward displays and posturings
> of false concern. She knows that she
> must always maintain the facade because she is a political
> animal. She is constantly on the lookout for each opportunity to
> slapping the scarlet badge of bigotry and racism on others as a
> cloak for her own occasional "wardrobe malfunctions".
>
> The fact that someone like Laurel Lunt Prussing was ever able to
> hold a public office is a testimony not only to the power of
> deep pockets in the political game but also to the sheer ignorance
> and apathy of the hapless electorate.
>
> That's pretty much how I see her, but I might think of something
> else later on.
>
>
> John W. wrote:
>> It's funny...I agree with Ricky but I also agree with some of
>> what you say, Wayne.
>>
>>
>> On Sat, Jan 3, 2009 at 9:54 PM, E. Wayne Johnson <ewj at pigs.ag
>> <mailto:ewj at pigs.ag>> wrote:
>>
>> Ricky,
>>
>> I think it is reasonable to state your opinion and state your
>> case.
>>
>> I don't think that is reasonable to equate things that are
>> under the control of a landlord ("toxic waste") with things
>> that are not under the control of the landlord (behaviour of
>> the tenants and their guests).
>>
>>
>> Ah, but that IS very much under the control of the landlord.
>>
>> First of all, the landlord screens the tenants, and determines
>> what type of tenants s/he wants living in her/his building.
>> There are certain fundamental bases upon which a landlord cannot
>> discriminate, but the landlord can most certainly discriminate on
>> the basis of credit history, prior negative history with the
>> tenant union, a background of criminal convictions or civil
>> judgments, etc.
>>
>> I live in an apartment building with 11 units. We all sign a
>> lease, which is a binding contract. One of the provisions in the
>> lease is that we not make excessive noise. If one of my
>> neighboring tenants is making excessive noise, I first go and
>> talk to the tenant directly. If that approach fails, I phone my
>> landlord, who is very conscientious and wants to maintain a
>> decent building. The landlord then phones the offending tenant,
>> and warns him or her to keep the noise down. That generally
>> works, because the landlord has every legal right to boot the
>> noisy tenant's ass out of the building for violating a term of
>> the lease. The tenant has control over his/her behavior, and the
>> landlord has control over the premises and who is on the premises.
>>
>> Should my appeal to the landlord fail, I then call the police,
>> and a complaint is lodged against the noisy tenant. I don't
>> recall seeing "excessive noise" in the Urbana ordinance, but I
>> personally don't want to live in the vicinity of noisy tenants.
>> My rent entitles me to, among other things, the "quiet enjoyment"
>> of my domicile, and I take that very seriously.
>>
>>
>>
>> As many others have pointed out, the ordinance is likely to
>> be unevenly enforced, and at best, it is completely
>> misdirected in that it does not address any of the roots of
>> the problem.
>>
>>
>> Virtually nothing in our criminal justice system addresses the
>> underlying roots of the crime problem. There's nothing unique
>> about this ordinance. "Solving" crime is, methinks, largely
>> beyond the powers of the City of Urbana.
>>
>>
>>
>> *
>>
>> Since I moved to Urbana from Guangzhou in China in 2001, the
>> Philo Road area has collapsed
>> with several businesses there closing (Kmart, the shoe store,
>> 3 or 4 various small shoppes in Sunnycrest, the dental center,
>> the IGA store, and Piccadilly Liquors), Lincoln Square has
>> completely imploded and died, and several other
>> small businesses have either died or failed to thrive. (/I
>> am confident that I didn't jinx Urbana by my arrival./)
>>
>>
>> This is all unfortunate and I don't quite understand it. It
>> seems to me that Lincoln Square is in a choice location and
>> should be thriving. But what's your point? Is this loss of
>> business responsible for the crime problem in Urbana?
>>
>>
>>
>> At the onset I had a generally positive view of Urbana's new
>> Mayor as I had credited her
>> (falsely) with attracting some of the new activities and new
>> construction occurring on her watch.
>>
>> At my very first meeting with her, she told me that the
>> financial activities of the city should not be known by the
>> people. We had a long
>> hard fight with her on the issue of transparency in the local
>> government with much chicanery on her part. Among all the
>> things that she did
>> the most dastardly was the placement of "fluff" referenda on
>> the ballot to block the activity of grassroots democracy in
>> querying the will of
>> the people. It became clear to me that the goal of the mayor
>> and her supporters was remain in power, and to squelch all
>> external voices.
>>
>>
>> Remaining in power seems to be the goal of most politicians,
>> though considerably less so on the local than on the national
>> level. It's the rare politician who does the "right" thing
>> irrespective of the political consequences, and I've seen those
>> politicians take as much or more flack from citizens than any of
>> the others. You can't please all of the voters all of the time
>> no matter WHAT you do and how conscientious you are.
>>
>>
>>
>> At the city council meeting in early December where a
>> transparency referendum was discussed, she got her facts a
>> bit confused and
>> attributed events surrounding IRV petitioning with those
>> having to do with the transparency issue.
>>
>> In all cases, the goal of those of us working on transparency
>> and IRV was to improve the quality of local government.
>> Transparency is going to become more and more important as
>> city revenues shrink, expenditures balloon, and deficits loom.
>> IRV is a great idea, and Urbana's ruling class is terrified
>> that the people might actually get a voice in city government.
>>
>> Mayor Prussing has made herself the National poster child of
>> elitism and the mailed fist in city government.
>> All tyrants have their supporters, and quite likely most
>> pompous prigs like Laurel Lunt Prussing
>> did not start out to be as arrogant and authoritarian as they
>> inevitably turned out to be, or were found out to be, later on.
>>
>>
>> There's no doubt that Mayor Prussing is an elitist, just like a
>> good many readers of this list. She's led a pretty privileged
>> life, and it's the only life she knows. ("Mailed fist", on the
>> other hand, is pure libertarian speak.) Despite that, I agree
>> with Ricky that there could be FAR worse mayors. Laurel, despite
>> her privileged life, is surprisingly UNpompous and UNarrogant.
>>
>> John Wason
>>
>>
>>
>> Wayne
>>
>>
>>
>> Ricky Baldwin wrote:
>>> Sorry, but I have to say that we may disagree with this
>>> ordinance - or some of us may agree - but the reasons given
>>> for it at the Urbana City Council's "committee of the whole"
>>> meeting where this was debated were not crazy or rightwing.
>>> People who live in neighborhoods, particularly poor
>>> neighborhoods, are often forced to live next to rental
>>> property where a great deal of dangerous, anti-social
>>> behavior occurs. The police may be little help or may not
>>> be able to get convictions, or to get convictions to stick,
>>> or otherwise unable to abate the hazard. If a landlord had
>>> toxic waste spilling out of a rental property into poor (or
>>> "middle class") neighbors' homes and/or yards, very few of
>>> us would object to the City or the Mayor trying to clean it
>>> up. If it was tenants who were dumping the waste, we would
>>> not object to the City demanding their expulsion. But there
>>> are other kinds of hazrds, some of which most of us have
>>> never had to live next to.
>>>
>>> We may or may not believe that these reasons justify this
>>> action. We may feel that authorities are being given too
>>> much latitude in this particular version of an ordinance
>>> that *could* be justified if more limited. These takes
>>> would be understandabe and reasonable. But I fail to see
>>> how this action makes Laurel Prussing's credentials as a
>>> "progressive" somehow suspect. Or that "she is getting
>>> worse, and worser, and worserer". That seems to me throwing
>>> the baby out with the bath water.
>>>
>>> What am I missing here?
>>>
>>> I have disagreed with Laurel Prussing from time to time.
>>> She was dead wrong on IRV, for example, and I said so in the
>>> News-Gazette and told her so on the phone. She was wrong in
>>> her objections to the Resolution in Support of the Employee
>>> Free Choice Act most recently (although she didn't really
>>> try to block it in the end). But in general I believe she
>>> has been a very good mayor, much better than any other mayor
>>> I believe I have ever personally experienced. I don't say
>>> that lightly. But she has taken courageous stands against,
>>> for example, drug testing City employees willy-nilly. She
>>> was very public in her support for the citizens' police
>>> review board, established a commission to study it, allowed
>>> the grassroot to name the people who would serve on it, and
>>> worked to make it happen over months. She caught a lot of
>>> flak for that and never flinched. And so on. She attended
>>> AWARE's postcards for peace event at the IMC, too - how many
>>> mayors would do that?
>>>
>>> Obviously this is not an exhaustive list. It isn't meant to
>>> be. Of course it is right and just to disagree with any
>>> politician or elected official anytime they're wrong, just
>>> as we should support them when they are right. And we have
>>> the right to run against any politician or elected official
>>> as we see fit, for whatever reasons. This is not about
>>> that. I also understand that we get excited in the heat of
>>> conflict, over issues we feel strongly about. Many of us
>>> have divergent views on a number of issues, and that's just
>>> fine. But I had to say that I find this a
>>> mischaracterization of a generally very good mayor. I would
>>> be dishonest if I did not.
>>>
>>> Ricky
>>>
>>> "Speak your mind even if your voice shakes." - Maggie Kuhn
>>>
>>>
>>> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
>>> *From:* E. Wayne Johnson <ewj at pigs.ag> <mailto:ewj at pigs.ag>
>>> *To:* Randall Cotton <recotton at earthlink.net>
>>> <mailto:recotton at earthlink.net>
>>> *Cc:* peace-discuss at lists.chambana.net
>>> <mailto:peace-discuss at lists.chambana.net>
>>> *Sent:* Friday, January 2, 2009 8:47:20 PM
>>> *Subject:* Re: [Peace-discuss] Re: Nuisance Ordinance and Racism
>>>
>>> >>And Prussing is supposed to be progressive?
>>>
>>> She IS progressive. She gets worse, and worser, and worserer.
>>
>>
>
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