Item A: Downtown Public Safety Zone

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ATTACHMENT B - Public Comments Received HAWLEY Carter R From:Northrup <blar3@juno.com> Sent:Sunday, December 11, 2011 8:26 AM To:HAWLEY Carter R Subject:Downtown Exclusion Zone: Excluding Due Process from Downtown To: The Eugene City Council, In Care Of: Police Commission analyst Carter Hawley. Subject: Public Comment regarding the Downtown Exclusion Law. Message: I remain concerned about the law. It deprives an unconvicted person of due process under our United States of America Constitution. Whenever government and law enforcement abridge our bedrock rights,and indicate to us that they will only do so in a judicious manner, it greatly concerns me. We can't wink at our constitution. This law doesn't give it even lip service because unless a person is convicted, they are to be treated as innocent. The exclusion allows them to be treated as guilty until otherwise determined. This is a baby version of keeping detainees at Guantanamo without due process of law, just on a smaller scale. The reasons are all exactly the same: You're trying to keep us safe but find that our constitutionally protected bedrock liberties are just so much a bother. You could make the case that any number of wrong police tactics could yield fruit to make our society "safer", but we have Miranda rights and many other things that we cannot go around. In the end, when we abridge our laws for the worst offenders, we abridge them for all. Today's blatant problem persons are tomorrows wrongful exclusion cases. Suppose that your employment was downtown, or you had critical business downtown that your livelihood, mortgage payment and children's welfare depended on, but you were excluded when you would ultimately be found not guilty of any thing. It is not fitting for the America people to grant to any governing authority the right to abridge and fore go the constitution under the idea that, hey, they'll do a good job with it. Last time I checked, government throughout history abridges bedrock rights. It is not be granted this authority. It certainly isn't to grant itself this authority. Yet this is what has happened. The police want an abridgment of our U. S. Constitution. The Council colludes with it and makes an ordinance, as if that makes it right. 1 Attachment B - Page 12