The ASUC Senate weighed in on the city of Berkeley’s controversial civil sidewalks ballot measure Wednesday, voting overwhelmingly to oppose the measure.
Measure S, which residents will vote on in November, would make sitting or lying on sidewalks in Berkeley commercial districts from 7 a.m. to 10 p.m. a punishable offense.
The measure aims to revitalize business in the city but has been criticized for its potential effects on Berkeley’s homeless community. The Berkeley City Council voted 6-3 to put Measure S on the November ballot in July.
“It’s about making our community friendly, welcoming, and feeling safe,” said Roland Peterson, executive director of the Telegraph Business Improvement District, at the ASUC meeting.
Senate Bill 64 — which the ASUC Senate voted 18-1, with one abstention, to endorse — calls Measure S “deeply misguided” and denounces the spirit of sit-lie laws. Last year’s senate voted 18-1 to oppose a similar sit-lie ordinance that the City Council was considering.
A first violation of Measure S would be categorized as a minor infraction and result in a $75 fine or community service, according to the measure’s text, but a second violation could be classified as either an infraction or a misdemeanor. The American Civil Liberties Union and the National Lawyers Guild has come out against the measure.
“This is a mean-spirited and callous way of approaching the homeless issue,” said CalSERVE Senator Nolan Pack to loud applause at Wednesday’s meeting. “It pushes people that are already marginalized further into the margins of society.”
But Student Action Senator Tom Lee, who was the only senator to vote against the bill, said the measure could improve student safety, adding that it is the duty of the ASUC to prioritize student concerns.
“My community members have come up to me and shared bad experiences of being harassed by homeless people,” Lee said.
A joint ASUC-Graduate Assembly poll conducted in October of 2011 found that 66% of respondents surveyed would frequent Telegraph Avenue businesses more often if the area felt “safer,” “cleaner” and “more inviting.”
Cooperative Movement Senator Jorge Pacheco challenged the accuracy of that survey, questioning whether members of the Berkeley Student Cooperative community were represented in its statistics. An attempt to amend the bill to include the results of the survey ultimately failed at the meeting.
CalSERVE Senator Megan Majd suggested that if the homeless were banned from sitting on sidewalks in commercial districts, they might be forced to enter residential areas.
If the measure is approved by voters in the November election, it will go into effect on July 1, 2013.
Contact Jeremy Gordon at [email protected].
Comment Policy
Comments should remain on topic, concerning the article or blog post to which they are connected. Brevity is encouraged. Posting under a pseudonym is discouraged, but permitted. The Daily Cal encourages readers to voice their opinions respectfully in regard to the readers, writers and contributors of The Daily Californian. Comments are not pre-moderated, but may be removed if deemed to be in violation of this policy. Click here to read the full comment policy.
Is there a site that would show how various areas in Berkeley vote? After this election, it would be very interesting to see how the various areas of the city voted on this measure.
Sort of. But you have to do some work to get at it: The Alameda County Registrar of Voters will issue a statement of the vote which will show break-down by precinct. You’d then need to compare that to a precinct map, which you can buy for a gajillion dollars from the Alameda County Registrar of Voters, or get for free as a PDF from the Berkeley City Clerk’s section of the City website. Right now, the City’s precinct map doesn’t reflect redistricting, but it sounds like they’ll release an updated map before the election. However, there’s roughly 130 precincts, so, like I said, it’ll take a little work.
We know that Measure S isn’t about harassment or obstructing the sidewalk, because those are already illegal.
We know that homeless people (whom some would tell you are all “smart-ass gutter punks”) are like anyone else: some aren’t so nice, and some will light up your whole day. (I had one friendly guy offer to record an album with me the other night! If I could sing a note, I would have taken him up on it–he’s pretty good on the guitar.)
We know sit/lie has been a complete failure in San Francisco. Businesses haven’t made a single dollar more, the streets aren’t safer, and nobody has been helped to find services.
And we know that Measure S would make it a crime for a child to sit down and tie her shoe, for me to meditate, for you to sit down at a bus stop where there’s no bench.
Why are the proponents pushing so hard for it, then? It would give downtown landlords greater control over public space.
I understand discomfort. I was raised to be uncomfortable around a lot of demographics, too–I come from a corner of the country where most middle class white folks are afraid of poor people and afraid of people of color.
I can’t conquer that discomfort by banning those people from public space. It wouldn’t be fair, and it would lull me into ignorance. I would be shoving away knowledge about the people our society treats worst.
If we want to keep our public space public, we need to fight for it. We need to be out there knocking on doors. The No on S folks are doing amazing work, and they need lots of help. Now is the time to get out there and flex your political muscles; the power to stand up for each other is what democracy should be all about.
So you support having people sit on the streets so you have the knowledge that there are people worse off than you. What have you done with that knowledge?
So you’re saying its ok to get harassed daily just so you can meditate? Selfish prick.
good work senators!!
Another cowardly act by the ASUC Senate. If it cared so much about the homeless squatters why doesn’t it open up the ASUC store, Bear’s Lair, and art studio to sleeping homeless people during business hours and at night? There’s plenty of room on the floor next to the merchandise and I’m sure the noble homeless street kids would never steal anything.
It’s not cowardly to stand up for the rights (1st Amendment or otherwise) of those whose interests rarely get considered.
There’s no “constitutional right” to squat on a public sidewalk day in and day out.
Students, forget what these clowns at ASUC are saying. It’s no secret that you do get harassed every day, not by aging chronic homeless folks, but by young, able-bodied, nomadic gutter punks. This measure is being considered because of the shitty behavior specifically coming from these a-holes. Students AND residents have to put up with this shit. So do yourselves and this city a favor and vote yes on “S”. It’s what the people of Berkeley are asking for and it’s why it will be on our November ballot.
Imagine a safe and clean Telegraph Avenue where you can peacefully go to and fro without being bothered. It can be a reality.
Read the full text of the measure.
Can you say a bit more about what you mean by ‘harassed,’ and why, if this problem is so prevalent and acute, you’re not talking to the police when it occurs and invoking the already existing statutes against harassment to address it?
Not everyone who is harassed (if you don’t get what I mean, I’m not going to bother explaining it) takes the time to report and identify perps to cops. Doesn’t mean it doesn’t happen. And it’s enough of a problem that MANY local businesses and residents are stepping up and saying enough is enough. Students will too. And if this measure passes in November you’re going to have to ask yourself why people feel so strongly that such drastic measures have to be taken. See, there’s a very real problem in this city that is not being addressed, whether you want to acknowledge it or not.
The people (and students) will decide in November. G’night.
Berkeleyan, whatever you might choose to think about this situation, the fact is Measure S will not accomplish anything useful for anyone. It’s a proven failure, in SF no one has benefited, not merchants, shoppers, homeless people, no one. Making it illegal to sit down on a sidewalk is barbaric and counter-productive. Plenty of laws already protect us if someone – homeless or not – harasses or attacks. You may not like how homeless people look, you might not want to see them out there, but Measure S accomplishes nothing other than to waste tax money and police time while booting homeless people around from spot to spot. This won’t help you, or anyone.
@Chris: Laws against harassment, like laws against robbery or theft, need accompanying laws to reduce loitering and unlawful gatherings to be more effective. Homeless people can just as easily sleep in People’s Park as Telegraph Ave.
I agree. I do not enjoy having to cross the street to avoid the hoard of young nomad punks with their pit bulls standing around blocking my way smoking weed…especially when the sun goes down, because they get even more crazy…
And you and your peers don’t need that added distraction when you’re trying to have a good time in college and focus so hard on your education that you can continue on to grad school or wind up giving back to society. You need to have a safe and respectful space to exist and learn.
We Berkeleyan residents and natives (as am I) wouldn’t mind such an atmosphere too. Hell, it’s not like most of these gutter punks are even from around here either.
Calman, talk to your friends about this measure. Have them talk to their friends. Leave this city once you graduate better than you found it. Get out there, register, and vote on this. Thank you.
…And don’t let opponents of the measure try and tell you it’s anti-homeless. That’s just bullsh*t and everyone knowns it.
That makes sense to me. I avoid being near male college students, having been sexually harassed so many times.
I wish someone would make it illegal to smoke weed.
As for the concerns about Cal students’ safety:
1) I imagine a number of students confuse being asked for money, food, or drugs with being ‘harassed.’
2) It’s already illegal to harass (or, of course, mug, threaten, etc) students, with or without a Sit/Lie law.
3) In 2011, more Cal students were physically assaulted by UCPD (cf. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B_f06VQOkI4) than by homeless people.
4) It’s damn near impossible to physically harm someone while sitting or lying down.
As for concerns about Telegraph being ‘safer, cleaner, and more inviting,’ it may well be true that more people would spend money at the corporate/franchised restaurants that dominate upper Telegraph if there were fewer homeless people around (hence the thinly veiled attempt to use Measure S as a pretext to kick homeless people out of commercial areas, full stop). It’s also true that homeless people’s interests matter, too — along with a more abstract interest in preserving a robust, accessible public sphere — and must be weighed against the business interests of these establishments. We might even go as far as to consider (gasp) the positive aspects of the homeless folks who hang out on and near Telegraph, rather than just viewing them as a monolithic bloc to be dealt with: their ability to panhandle and busk, the music, poetry, etc they contribute, their ability to find one another and socialize, their ability to use public space freely in general. These aspects are almost always missing from purely liberal analyses of the measure. In other words, it matters whether the streets are ‘safe and inviting’ to homeless people, too; Sit/Lie laws ensure, by design, that they are not.
It’s also worth considering that perhaps upper Telegraph would draw more business if it weren’t increasingly dominated by bad corporate food (Chipotle, Toaster Oven, Subway, Jamba Juice, Yogurtland, etc.) and douchey bars (Kip’s, Pappy’s). My deterrent to visiting Telegraph isn’t the homeless people; it’s the way it’s turning into a privately policed shopping mall — ironically what the supporters of S seem to have in mind when they talk about preserving a ‘vibrant’ street culture.
Bravo to Nolan Pack and the ASUC.
–Joey Shemuel, counselor for homeless youth and lifelong Berkeleyan
Harassment can be defined differently by individuals: we are not trying to figure out what legal definition of harassment is. If any student feels uncomfortable, if they feel like their rights to safety and privacy is violated, if they feel the psychological stress and anxiety, IF THE STUDENTS DON’T FEEL SAFE – that is called harassment. I can walk up to you and walk right next to you all day and not be condemned to the court of law – but you would call that harassment, will you not?
ASUC REPRESENTS STUDENTS. IF YOU WANT TO PUT THE RIGHTS AND THE STAKE OF HOMELESS OVER STUDENTS, GO RUN FOR MAYOR, THE PRESIDENT OF HOMELESS GROUPS. YOU WERE CHOSEN TO REPRESENT THE 35,000 STUDENTS WHO UNDERGO FEAR AND STRESS DAILY AS THEY WALK BY THESE NOMADS CROUCHING ON THE SIDEWALK.
Yep, I think there are stalking statutes in place against that. You can file a TRO.
My point is not that they’re not feeling anxiety, nor that nothing should be done about that anxiety. But a large source of that anxiety, judging from the comments on here and other stories about Sit/Lie, seems to be having to share public space with people who are “dirty vagrants,” having to step over a homeless person (as a caller to KQED’s Forum show put it). Cal students need to think about what it means to have public space. For example, I can’t stand being around frat row on a Friday or Saturday night, but my solution is not to clamp down on public drunkenness; it’s to take a deep breath and deal with it, because people’s right to enjoy public space (even just the sidewalk between one frat and the next) how they want to outweighs my intermittent feelings of annoyance or distress — and ensures that when I want to walk drunkenly in public I can (or when you want to sit down on the sidewalk, you can).
No, this is not about hanging out with dirty/unsightly people and you know it. It’s about smart-ass gutter punks who exhibit disdain for anyone who’s part of “the system”. They taunt and harass people all the time. And they self-identify as “gutter punks” so don’t try to say I’m pinning the label on ‘em.
Quit mischaracterizing the situation … then again, you may actually believe what you’re saying.
He probably believes what he’s saying because it makes sense. Need a napkin? Got some foam on your lip, there…
There are jerks in every group of society. What about frat guys belching and yelling outside a bar at night, or outside a frat party–often intimidating women, making a mess, getting into fights—way more disruptive than some punk kids sitting on a sidewalk with a dog. I don’t see anyone legislating that! This is a scapegoating attack on homeless people and you know it.
Goodness me! Who says things like “Know your place!”?
It seems, though, like a legal definition of “harassment” might be useful if you’re trying to make something related to “harassment” illegal…
Feigned indignation is no substitute for having something of substance to say, little girl. Or are you emulating the Obama style of debate here?
> It’s also true that homeless people’s interests matter, too
Why is it in their “interest” to hang around and get in the way
> It’s also worth considering that perhaps upper Telegraph
> would draw more
business if it weren’t increasingly dominated
> by bad corporate food
(Chipotle, Toaster Oven, Subway,
> Jamba Juice, Yogurtland, etc.)
Yet it’s that same “bad corporate food” that your little mascots panhandle for.
> –Joey Shemuel, counselor for homeless
> youth and lifelong Berkeleyan
Another professional poverty pimp with a personal investment in letting vagrants have their way at the expense of law-abiding productive folk.
I love the irony of commentators on a college website hating on those who ask for drugs.
The point about the crappy food is not that everyone should eat organic. Look, the merchants have been blaming the downturn on the homeless with one huge logical fallacy, namely, that since there have been lots of homeless people since business has slowed (and before), it must be a result of their presence (correlation ain’t causation). My point is that homelesness is a symptom of the bad economy, not its cause. Measure S, along with the rhetoric of fear that’s been used, distorts that and uses homeless populations as a scapegoat. The fact that you question why it might be in somebody’s interest to simply be in public space just shows how easily that scapegoating can be accomplished.
But for the sake of argument let’s assume that your goal of ridding the sidewalks of “vagrant” homeless people is a noble goal. Will S accomplish that? Or will it work like Measure L did in SF, where people are cited, re-cited, jailed, and released back onto the streets (since no one’s adding services), wasting everyone’s time and money along the way?
> I love the irony of commentators on a college
> website hating on those who ask for drugs.
The fact that you think such behavior is defensible is a clear sign you have some issues yourself.
> My point is that homelesness is a symptom
> of the bad economy, not its cause.
So-called “homelessness” in Berkeley is the direct result of idiots like you who promote a bum-friendly environment to harass productive people and promote your class-warfare philosophy.
What’s wrong with someone asking for drugs? I’m curious. Someone on the street might just as well ask you to sign a petition for legislation with which you disagree, or to take a Scientology stress test. This seems like an apt opportunity to invoke the ‘just say no’ response that anti-drug crusaders are always promoting, no? Existing in public spaces (or ‘the commons,’ if you prefer) sometimes means coming into contact with people, beliefs, and behaviors to which one might object.
> What’s wrong with someone asking for drugs?
Thanks for making my point, asshole. You’re clearly a narcissistic little left-wing fruitcake who coddles losers and defends them as your way of giving the finger to the rest of society for not catering to your particular agenda. Regardless of your chronological age, you have clearly never grown up.
Format of your argument:
1) Avoid direct question posed to you in earnest and instead assert that it proves your point (without specifying which point, exactly)
2) Ad hominem
3) Unfounded accusations
4) More ad hominem.
5) QED?…
In Berkeley, I wouldn’t say that homeless people are the cause or result of the economy. The homeless in Berkeley have always been here. They are here because of the weather and the resources the area provides. I would say the street vendors and the non-students who walk Telegraph would chase away more students than the homeless.
Any downturn that Telegraph businesses are experiencing are more likely the result of changes that affect students. I don’t think the students worry about the taste of the food available as much as they might worry more about the cost. Paying more than $5 for many meals on Telegraph along with the increased costs of school are probably causing students to find less expensive meals elsewhere.
However, I do support the measure, because I don’t think having people sitting at our feet as we walk by is doing anything to help. We just ignore the problem, and I think the measure would cause us to have to find ways to help instead of just continuing to ignore the problem. Someone posted here that it would drive the homeless into the residential areas. That would probably get Berkeley active in trying to help the homeless. Once home owners are affected, then the city will act.
I see several people commenting about the failure of a similar measure in San Francisco. That measure doesn’t seem to be a complete failure. There are a couple of hardcore homeless that continue to be ticketed, but the rest of the sidewalk sitters have moved on to Golden Gate Park.
“My point is that homelesness is a symptom of the bad economy, not its cause.”
Let’s assume you are right. What should you do when you can’t get enough income or get laid off? Do you stop washing your hair and stop wearing clean clothes because your exterior appearance is a symptom of your low income? Or do you try to make yourself look more professional, wear nice clothes, and then interview for a new job? People and businesses that are already suffering don’t need to LOOK like they’re suffering too, they can polish their image and try to recover from Obama’s wrecked economy.
If you have low income, you may not have the money or resources to afford professional looking clothes.
Ever heard of a thrift shop? You can actually buy used, presentable clothes for far less than you would pay for tattoos, piercing, and those F@#$ing idiotic ear stretcher things that make you look like a circus freak. You need to stop kidding yourself with this nonsense that these losers are just earnest young adults who merely want a job – it makes you look like a freaking fool.
So, there’s this thing called a hierarchy of needs. Have you ever tried to go job-searching while you didn’t have a place to stay or shower?