Street Roots editorial
Oregon statutes are filled with preemptions, those
law-of-the-land overrides on local government.
They have their supporters and detractors, depending on what
side of the argument you’re on, but in the best of matters they can be
protections against the whittling away of civil rights that we hold self
evident.
One such preemption is that if you’re going to get removed
from a public sidewalk for being a nuisance, the people removing you had better
have a good reason. The burden of proof that you intended to be a nuisance is
on them.
That’s been a thorn in the side of Portland’s sidewalk laws
for years. Locally, sidewalk laws have tried to prohibit people from sitting
and lying on public thoroughfares, but they get tripped up when the state says
you can’t just wholesale remove or harass people just because you don’t want
them around. Freedom of expression prevails.
The first significant chip in this civil liberty is winding
its way through the State Legislature now. It’s a bill that would change state
law to prevent it from preempting a city’s authority to regulate or control the
public’s use of its sidewalks. The Portland Business Alliance is pushing the
bill, with the less than veiled intention to ban sitting and lying on sidewalks
entirely, homeless included. In other words, Oregon — on this issue — keep
those pesky civil liberties off our sidewalks.
To be sure, there is illegal behavior on our sidewalks, and
aggression and violence should be met with police enforcement, just as our laws
currently allow. And indeed, sidewalks are intended to facilitate pedestrian
traffic, which our laws protect as well. In addressing violations, the onus is
on the police, where it belongs. Extending prohibitions on sitting and lying on
sidewalks beyond this is to target people not intentionally breaking any laws
or blocking a single step. And history bears out that the people caught up in
this net are predominantly homeless.
Street Roots wants to see a thriving business community. We
want safe sidewalks, and we want individuals and organizations to respect one
another and work in partnership toward a better tomorrow. With a $25 million shortfall
in our city’s budget, and 10 percent cuts hitting our most vital services for
sheltering our city’s thousands of homeless men, women and children, we should
be rolling up our sleeves looking for ways to work better together, not
slipping through back doors to grab the upper hand. The House should kill this
bill.
Oregon’s founding fathers crafted a constitution that, like
its federal counterpart, makes paramount the protection of free speech, but
with even broader strokes:
“No law shall be passed restraining the free expression of
opinion, or restricting the right to speak, write, or print freely on any
subject whatever; but every person shall be responsible for the abuse of this
right.”
To that we say, hear, hear. And here, too, if you please.
For Street Roots news coverage on this issue go here.
This article appears in 2013-03-01.