RVs Parked Overnite in SF Must Hit the Road

http://www.sfexaminer.com/local/tra...-parked-overnight-san-francisco-have-hit-road

Article is as follows:

RVs parked overnight in San Francisco have to hit road
By: Joshua Sabatini | 09/25/12 8:36 Pm
Sf Examiner Staff Writer


MIKE KOOZMIN/THE S.F. EXAMINER
Home on wheels: Advocates for the homeless say legislation on RV parking approved by the Board of Supervisors will hurt homeless people who have nowhere else to go. The City is developing a plan to get people living in their vehicles into temporary housing.
Despite concerns from advocates for the homeless, San Francisco officials on Tuesday enacted a ban on overnight parking of recreational vehicles in certain parts of The City.
Starting March 1, the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency will begin installing signs prohibiting the parking of vehicles more than 22 feet in length or 7 feet in height between midnight and 6 a.m in some areas. A complete list of locations will be determined later by the SFMTA, but chronic problem areas such as parts of both the Sunset and Bayview districts are expected to be included.
The prolonged parking of oversized vehicles has angered residents for attracting graffiti or for being eyesores.
Others have complained about the behavior of those who use vehicles as their homes.
“I’m tired of my neighborhood being the dump,” said Supervisor Malia Cohen, whose district includes the Bayview. “What you find are people who are wealthy enough and own these vehicles actually don’t park them in their own neighborhood, they actually park them on the southeastern part of The City.”
Cohen added that those living in vehicles are creating a health concern.
“I’m talking about human excrement lying on the streets and the sidewalks. No one needs to live like this,” she said.
The legislation, authored by Supervisor Carmen Chu, was approved by the Board of Supervisors in a 7-4 vote Tuesday. Chu said current laws, such as a ban on parking for more than 72 hours, are not working. Supervisors Jane Kim, Christina Olague, John Avalos and David Campos opposed the legislation, siding with homeless advocates who blasted the proposal as a mean-spirited attack.
“We’re really disappointed that during the economic crisis that the city of San Francisco is further criminalizing people who have no choice but to live in RVs,” said Jennifer Friedenbach, executive director of the Coalition on Homelessness.
City officials said they plan to offer free vehicle storage to those who agree to enter temporary housing and receive city services. A 2011 estimate found at least 165 people were homeless and living in vehicles.
jsabatini@sfexaminer.com

My Rebuttal defense l (printed) was the following:

"I'm a college art & design prof forced into being house-less 7 years ago. I hit the ground running as a working artist to make enough money to live, traveling to tourist towns. People love my local artwork. (My van is nice, but oops, marginally taller than 7 ft, but, hey —I still can't stand up in it!) Urban Legend: The public defecation fabrication is as hyped as the gypsy-baby-stealing story that's been recycled for at least a century & was used as an excuse to burn out gypsy camps. I first heard it in Italy ages ago. I've rarely seen people poop since there are open toilets & folks like me have port-a-potties & capped containers which are daily emptied in toilets. I've more often tracked messy people with big dogs (did you take a stool sample to the lab?) or on a rare occasion —just plain blithering drunks who would defecate in their own backyards. After all they sleep on the same hallowed ground. ALL of the people I've witnessed ever urinated on or close to my vehicle to date were young drunk partiers from out of town. Or the few teenage anarchists rebelling. It's easy to throw syringes, bottles & trash down next to someone you hate in order to call attention to them, but it's circumstantial evidence & why would people who need to park there do it? Sounds more like an enemy trying to frame them. Me, —I pick up all the nearby trash.

Now, I can no longer go to Venice Beach & now, as I had planned, to San Francisco, because of this short-sighted, selfish parking rule with no alternative in place. Well, aren't those 'public' streets? After all, the Native Americans (who we stole all this from) believe, 'no one can own the Land'. Where do the people of your towns think that all the free entertainment & art comes from & whether those performers who cater to their tourists actually make enough to live? It's like killing the goose that lays the golden egg since tourists visit California for its ambiance: both its scenery & its alternative lifestyles. But if the Yuppies want a 'Boring New World' now that they've 'made it', so be it, —they've turned into those very people they hated while we were all growing up!" —ØG

[I did not post this followup--too caustic!]

"This is merely legal torches & pitchforks.*Let's face it —in cities, you're living on top of each other like rats all fighting congestion, the job, commute & parking.*It's the same old tale: "First they came for the ______ (homeless), because no one cared about them... Then they came for the ______ etc…" Your Darwinian Capitalist Apoloclypes is coming, so keep your dirty town. It'll still be filthy when the motor homes are gone. "Cities are man's festering sores on the body politic! The curse of civilization is it's cities!" —Historian & Economist Arnold Toynbee" —ØG :devil:

 

Though I must admit there was a group of 3 vans of 'Pool Pissers' from OR hanging out in the parking lot of the Hostel in Sanitary Barbie last summer that ruined it for everybody, loud partying, drinking & acting all thug; not to mention leaving their trash on the ground right across from the train station & giving the otherwise nice-to-young-visitors cops shit. I mean this is a small rich town. When the cops gave them a warning to pick up their trash they waited til the cops left & threw it over the bushes onto the railroad tracks in front of the whole crowd on the station platform. There's retribution in the form of spiritual gravity coming & I hope they don't leave a path of devastation everywhere they go. Immature anarchy in the form of trashing a site does not work van camping in suburbia & that's why they pass these laws & bust the innocent campers who actually 'pick up trash'. No really. When you find a good spot you wind up picking up trash. You know that's true in state parks, why trash an urban environment? Some of it is beer bottles from college kids & drunk footballers from UK, too. There's a lot of hotels in the area & now if you even park there during the day & they suspect you are going to spend the night they put a huge printed threat to call the police sign on your windshield. I parked there & walked for a taco one afternoon & they did it within 45 minutes. And I wasn't even intending on staying. It was legal, but then again what do you do, call the cops & what do you say when they ask where you live... Anyway, curses on those people. Mainly the Indigo Hotel which was a flop-house turned bed & breakfast with a bunch of foreign investment owners. In fact most of the complaints to police originate from Hoteliers & Managers who want people to come pay their exorbitant prices rather than camp out. I don't want to seem racist but nearly all of the Hotels are owned by a few rich vigilant foreigners who are taking the money out of the country but using US laws against US kids & people. They've learned how to play the system, why don't we ever learn how to play it?!

 

That sucks so now you have to move? These NIMBY people drive me nuts. With the economy what it is more and more people have no choice but to turn to alternative options. These days it doesn't take much for people to find themselves in such a situation.

We could provide a place for people without homes to park or camp. There is so much land owned by fed,state and local governments just doing nothing. It wouldn't cost anything and would actually save money.

To bad you couldn't get enough people together and peacefully refuse to leave. They don't expect people to resist. They think by being proclaimed as unwanted people will simply move on to another place.

 

Venice Beach closed up after a long fight over issuing stickers. The Coastal Commission stalled for years. I think they just did an end-run with their highly restrictive overnighting signs invoking some City Ordinance. Scary-ass will tow you away signs. Fascist terror signs. (Yes, there were some trashy motor homes & chronics.) But where do they think the FREE artistic talent that works on the beach & draws the tourists to Venice actually live on the little they make? You can't expect the yuppies to tolerate an alternative lifestyle right under their very blue noses. People say it's the LA people pushing out to the Coast. It's a big status symbol to live on the Coast.

Personally I'd become a benevolent dictator & socialize everything 1 mile from every sea coast in the US. What about midwesterners who only get to catch a brief glimpse of the ocean maybe once in a lifetime while these rich people build their plush private estates; view-obscuring condos & ugly crap! It's a crime since Nature belongs to everyone.

Oh, the point that goes with the last one was why I brought this up: Venice promised after getting their way 'to allot parking for campers & RVers' —Wa-ha, haven't seen any of that political red-herring promise come to pass yet!