By Ben Boothe Santa Monica
I just moved to Santa Monica. I have invested a lot of time and money and dreams to come to this beautiful town, so that I can enjoy walks, a bicycle ride along the ocean, and sit and watch the sun set over the water. I had the choice to move my business to any city in the world and decided upon Santa Monica. It is not a cheap choice but one that I wanted to make.
Imagine my surprise when I took my first morning walk along the ocean, and wanted to sit and look but I could not find a place to sit, because all the benches were filled with sleeping street people. I tried to ride my bicycle, but the pathways were cluttered with street people pushing shopping carts with sleeping bags on the paths. I went for a walk to go to the Promenade and was accosted by a man on drugs, screaming at me, wanting me to give him money and my cell phone. I rode my bicycle near Highway 1 and noticed more than two dozen of them sleeping in the bushes on the steep cliffside dangerous to them and to the cars below. I tried to walk into a donut shop for breakfast, but the sidewalk and entrance was blocked by a man with a large bag of old clothes, with his dog, begging for free food and money.
Yesterday I rode my bicycle and counted more than 300 of them. It reminded me of the Washington Mall a few years ago. The government decided to be “charitable,” and they took over the mall grounds. It took three years and hundreds of incidents before D.C. changed its policy and decided it was more “compassionate” and safer for the community to pick them up and take them to “safe houses” and “shelters,” and not allow them to loiter in the parks.
Come on city leaders. Let’s clean this up. It is dangerous. It destroys the beauty of our city. And it is not fair to the street people or to the citizens. You know, if they don’t leave, people and companies like mine will leave. Who do you want to populate the city … street people, beggars and drug addicts? Or responsible citizens who work, pay taxes and try to keep a city beautiful?
Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on May 20, 2005. Read the original PDF.