County Shouldn’t Punish Civic Activists

Opinion & Editorial

Several Peace Camp 2010 demonstrators face criminal charges

By City on a Hill Press

City on a Hill Press

Published May 5, 2011 at 3:19 am

Illustration by Louise Leong.

The right to assemble is guaranteed in the First Amendment to the Constitution for a reason: liberty depends upon it.

This week, the Santa Cruz County Superior Court is moving forward with the trial of six people accused of illegally camping outside government buildings in the summer of 2010. Five men and one woman rolled out their sleeping bags over the summer with dozens of others who protested a city ordinance that bans sleeping outside at night in public places.

Peace Camp 2010, as it became known, began July 4 on the county courthouse steps and continued to Santa Cruz City Hall, where it ended in October. Many demonstrators were cited and arrested, but judges dismissed nearly all violations except for those of the six defendants in this week’s case.

Eliot “Bob” Anderson, Arthur Bishoff, Collette Connolly, Christopher Doyon, Gary Johnson and Ed Frey stand accused of breaking a state lodging law by participating in the protest against the anti-camping policy. If sentenced, the group could face jail time, exorbitant fines or community service.

On Tuesday, four defendants were found guilty, Anderson was dismissed because of a hung jury, and Doyon did not show up to court. He is now facing a warrant for arrest. Sentencing is expected on May 10.

The protest was intended to scrutinize the constitutionality of a policy with questionable implications. While thousands of homeless people reside in Santa Cruz County, there are only a couple hundred beds in county shelters to accommodate them.

Demonstrators argued that local governments’ insistence on presenting a wholesome image is infringing on the basic rights to life and liberty, including the very personal decision of where to sleep at night.

Because the camping ordinance criminalizes sleeping outside of a private residence, thousands of people need to “get on their feet” or “get out of town.” Unfortunately, both of these clichés are easier said than done.

Unemployment has made even the most qualified job seekers desperate for minimum wage employment. People without residences are often excluded from jobs, and while there are a few exceptions, most find the transition from street life to mainstream society painful and ultimately unsuccessful.

To top it off, state and local governments across the country actively expel the homeless with strictly enforced anti-camping policies. In more extreme cases, the homeless are bussed to other places.

Ordinances like the one in Santa Cruz exist across the country. The logic for many cities is that if sleeping outside is allowed in one town (especially a beautiful one with a mild climate), then the homeless will come flocking to sleep on the streets.

This may be true. However, the exclusion of residence-less persons from a community is both elitist and immoral. Santa Cruz should be concerned with maximizing liberty, not avoiding a population of people who sleep on the streets.

There is no point in targeting these six demonstrators, especially in light of charges being dropped against all other protesters. It is a way for the city to show that it is tough on crime. Yet, shouldn’t we be congratulating these protesters for recognizing a potentially unconstitutional policy and taking action against it?

Beyond the questionable ethics of the policy itself, there is no reasonable explanation for why these six people specifically are facing court charges.

The right to assemble is a clear and non-negotiable right in this country. It has been essential to important social movements throughout U.S. history: abolition after the Civil War, women’s suffrage after that, progressive reform in the 1930s, and most present in the recent consciousness, the civil rights movement of the 1960s.

For Santa Cruz to claim that the assembly of those six protesters was illegal because they were in sleeping bags is appalling. Peace Camp 2010 was a peaceful demonstration and, as such, it is protected under the First Amendment.

Basic rights are not contingent on a person’s residential status. Each of us has the right and the responsibility to protest unfair and discriminatory laws.

Comments

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danny

I’ve seen protest movements for over 40 years, starting from the Vietnam War. I once met Abbie Hoffman and William Kunstler. I once watched an SDS Weatherman event. I once met David Harris. I met the anti-apartheid student protesters at Stanford in the mid 1980′s.

I was online with “homeless” activists in the 1990′s to this date. I’ve told them what the score is. I’ve been pretty much degraded in favor of the ignorant beegshots in the protest movement.

I was deliberately barred from post secondary academic completion but I had to keep studying anyway when possible to keep up with my peers. All in the midst of poverty (often “homelessness”), disability of sorts, and oppression. I have seen the political corruption associated with society’s wealth distribution, the lion’s share going to the graduates. To me, the words in the City On a Hill article above are empty. The editorial “position” lacks credibility except as only a feather in the hat of future graduates here at UC Santa Cruz that will aid in future wealth grabbing. In contrast, when I recently started probing into “returning to college” at UC, they called the FBI to smash me down. You know the wealth curve of the families of UCSC students. It’s been always like that. I simply thought of getting a modest engineering degree, a small aerospace job, writing a much-improved college math textbook, and if there was time, studying a little agriculture. But to do this would be for me to become the criminal of competing with the rich kids.

The population of California is about 37 million. If one quarter is college graduate stock, then the effective poltical/economic population of California becomes less than 10 million. A much different society for you, right? Don’t forget your rubber gloves.

dannydhm_at_best_dot_com at yahoo dot com
danny

My email address somehow got misprinted. It is dhm_at_best_dot_com at yahoo dot com . My first name is danny. Editors, please post this or correct it above in case anyone wants to email me. Thanks, and you folks are really cool people despite any disagreement we might have over the content of my comment.
Robert Norse

For a chronicle of PeaceCamp2010, written by participants and supporters, go to http://www.peacecamp2010.blogspot.com/,’

There are numerous articles on indybay.org/santacruz–the most recent being
“Budget Considerations in the Peace Camp 2010 Trials” at http://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2011/05/09/18679267.php.Sentencing for the four “guilty” PC2010 defendants will be tomorrow (5-10-11) in Dept. 2 at 8:30 AM–with the results probably announced on http://www.indybay.org/santacruz .See also ”
Guilty…of Sleeping: Final Verdict for 4 of 5 PeaceCamp2010 Defendants
” at http://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2011/05/04/18678867.php .I am proposing that City Council rescind it’s cruel and unconstitutional 11 PM – 8:30 AM Sleeping Ban in addition to modifying Council procedures that limit or gag activists tomorrow at City Council’s Oral Communications period (5 PM at 809 Center St., City Council Chambers). I’ve written about the “mock-Nazi” salute case at ht tp://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2011/05/08/18679247.php .For those interested in fighting the anti-homeless laws or helping to put an Initiative on the ballot that would change the law in spite of the City Council’s refusal to act, contact HUFF (Homeless United for Friendship & Freedom) at rnorse3@hotmail.com, 831-423-4833, or come to the HUFF meeting 10:30 AM at the Sub Rosa Cafe at 703 Pacific Ave.
- danny
  
  I suppose Robert’s post above was a partly a response to mine. It really puts me to task here to explain my view even more. It is a nice political move to agree with the editorial board over the issue of peaceful assembly. I will differ in the interest of neutrality.Viewing the courthouse protest as “freedom of (peaceful) assembly” and the sleeping ban as “cruel and unusual punishment” is not rigorous enough for me. Example – the protesters could have been cited under 169 P.C. for trying to extrinsically influence the judges instead of being cited under the 647(e) illegal lodging. This is not to say that the courtroom favorites do not extrinsically influence the judges – they do it all the time. Cattle drives for the poor and oppressed, pigeon feeds for the attorneys and favored clients, and staffs who the judges have to always appease.So, let me draw a small historical analogy. Your older parents and grandparents should remember. In 1968, eight protesters were scapegoated for the riots that took place at the Democratic National Convention back east in Chicago. Like the courthouse 5 here in Santa Cruz, they were convicted in the political trial. There was much gratification among residents after the convictions because there had been so much disorder in their city which now appeared to be under control by nailing the people responsible. Many residents of Santa Cruz, rightly or wrongly, should feel a similar inner peace because of the convictions of the courthouse protesters.One of the Chicago Eight defendants, Bobby Seale, tried to drop out of the trial, claiming that it “wasn’t a legal proceeding”. He was then bound and gagged in the courtroom, and tortured behind the scenes. His trial was severed from the others’, turning them into ‘The Chicago 7′. By analogy, the Santa Cruz Courthouse 5 became the the Courthouse 4 when Chris Doyon dropped out. An “arrest” warrant for non-appearance has been issued against Doyon, without opposition to my knowledge from Robert Norse or Ed Frey. The Chicago defendants were acquitted on appeal long after anyone cared about them anymore. The Santa Cruz 5 should be eventually acquitted on the 9th Amendment arguments proffered by Ed Frey, if “lodging” can somehow be equated to “sleeping” etc. Doyon’s appearance or lack of appearance is not especially relevant to the ensuing case. More important to me is that in the absence of Ed Frey, the courts would sabotage the defense, making it impossible to effectively litigate any 9th Amendment claims. If you read the transcripts, you will see how the deputy prosecutor Sarah Dabkowski claims that the defendants “waived” their rights to a Constitutional defense. In the absence of Ed Frey, the judges would rubber stamp her false waiver claim all the way to the Supreme Court. So here is an injustice of class politics right in our faces.In my opinion (so far) the sleeping ban arguably does not violate cruel and unusual punishment per se although it might “as applied”. But it does violate the 9th Amendment in principle through the 14th amendment equal protection. So here is a philosophical difference between me and Robert although I respect his emotional view of the problem.I perhaps should mention that Santa Cruz seems to have a history of torture. Some years ago Steve Argue, a Santa Cruz activist, was tortured in jail. He had gotten physical with a policeman who was allegedly abusing an elderly woman. When then-mayor Mike Rotkin of UCSC facultydom was addressed with the torture issue, Rotkin chided Argue, telling him he “shouldn’t assault a policeman”. A few years after that, I was at a homeless center where a man was telling the staff that the deputies broke his arm when he was in jail in Santa Cruz.