Dear Oakdale,
Having returned recently from a scholarly stint in the bay, I was dismayed to find uprooted public benches, probing Leader articles, impassioned public debate, and a regrettable disdain for the “park people.” To my chagrin, I felt this personally while walking to Cafe Bliss, when I was curtly accosted by nearby store owner who interrogated meanly: “Are you one of those park people?”
I worry that the recent ordinance that diagnoses the issue as alcoholism is only the most recent contribution to the city-wide discourse about the ‘park people’ that has yielded unhealthy discussions about ‘who they are’, these members of our community. It also ignores many of the contributing factors to the development of such a habit, including but not limited to poverty, which is not an individual but a shared, social issue. This ordinance that endeavors to address the issue simplifies the atmosphere of causes and effects and generates a solution that addresses only a small part.
I want us to come to an effective solution like the rest of you. But labeling a complex and multifaceted issue of poverty, social stigmatization, and the rapid disappearance of the public space as one of ‘public drunkenness’ is misleadingly simplistic and infused with failed, outdated prohibitionist values. While treating a loose group of park-goers as “those people” does little more than create unnecessary fissures in our own community. The issue is far from resolved, so let us focus on creating inventive, inclusive solutions, such as shelters, or simply those that treat these ‘people’ as human beings in order to actually be that loving, inclusive Oakdale we purport to be.
(In my search for city council minutes, I also found it quite challenging to obtain a copy, anything after 2012,, which signals a possible but remediable barrier to public knowledge.)
Bearer of Pity 