By Jeremy Bloomberg Santa Monica
I’m not at all surprised that the city of Santa Monica would spend its limited resources harassing and persecuting small business owners over the use of signs rather than rid the city of the homeless and all of the problems they cause (SMDP, April 5, page 1).
Your photographs speak volumes about this issue, with one photograph showing tastefully installed signage being removed from a business by order of the city, while the other shows a homeless person sleeping soundly and undisturbed just outside a business.
City councilman Ken Genser is quoted as saying he has been disappointed the city hasn’t pursued these small business owners over signage more doggedly, but that he is now happy it is.
But that’s exactly what’s wrong with Santa Monica, where anti-business, anti-resident, anti-children, but pro-homeless politicians like Genser continue to enable the homeless to sleep on our sidewalks and parks, and use our sidewalks and parks as their toilets, all the while making it near impossible for small business owners to survive.
It’s time to run rascals like Genser and others who enable the homeless off of the City Council. Then we residents, our children, business owners and visitors can re-take our streets and parks, and feel safe again to walk those very streets, patronize local businesses and use our parks without encountering the mass of homeless and the human excrement the city council allows them to deposit.
Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on April 7, 2004. Read the original PDF.