CC Minutes - 08/06/01 Meeting - Laserfiche WebLink

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A. Expand the ordinance boundaries from 8th Avenue to l0th Avenue and Oak Street to Lincoln Street. It also included the language changes that dealt with the notice of exclusion and the right to appeal being printed on the exclusion form itself. B. The original boundaries for the ordinance were proposed with the same language changes for the exclusion form. Lieutenant Roberts noted that both &aris included the emergency clause so the ordinances could be implemented immediately. In response to a question from Councilor Kelly regarding why the item had been postponed from the July 23 meeting, City Manager Johnson said the item had been rescheduled because staff did not believe there would be six votes to adopt the ordinance that evening. Mayor Torrey opened the public hearing. Carol Berg, 2113 Riverview Street, said that the proposed ordinance was a band aid solution that was counterproductive, inhumane, and unconstitutional. She suggested that the next time a police funding measure was up for a vote the money should be used to construct an activity center for the youth being harassed on the mall. She opined that the council would make enemies by passing the ordinance and suggested that the council try to make friends instead. She commented that the mall exclusion ordinance had started small and was now spreading "like a cancer." Ms. Berg related that there had been a recent kids forum on the downtown mall and noted that none of the downtown business owners had bothered to show up. She urged rejection of the ordinance. Rachelle E. Perkins, 838 West 4th Avenue, said that the proposed ordinance was unconstitutional and a violation of civil rights. She said she was appalled that the council was even considering the question of implementing the ordinance. She stressed that exclusion as a means of addressing public safety was a dishonest and manipulative way to discriminate and would not work. Ms. Perkins said that the real crime was the marginalization and demonization of people that society had predisposed to poverty, and the veiling of social unease under the category of crime to make scapegoating of those who made people uncomfortable easier. Ms. Perkins begged those present to understand the realities of poverty, class, racism, and social isolation. She said that social programs worked better than relying on "the punishment industry." Ms. Perkins questioned who the council thought it was to exclude anyone from anywhere when it had never seen through the eyes of the people it was proposing to exclude. She suggested that council members do some grass roots work with those people and become more educated on their issues. She urged the council to "totally eradicate" the exclusion ordinance. Misha Seymour, 1313 Lincoln Street, raised concern over the exclusion ordinance. He called it an apartheid policy. He commented that the downtown area was already unfriendly enough to pedestrians since all of the MINUTES--Eugene City Council August 6, 2001 Page 5 Regular Meeting