This Week in the Mercury
Tuesday, October 7, 2008
News Sisters Of The Road Responds To Trib Article
Posted by Matt Davis on Tue, Oct 7, 2008 at 5:28 PM
Representatives of homeless nonprofit Sisters of The Road have been responding to an article in the Tribune last week about problems outside the cafe, at the Old Town Chinatown Neighborhood Association meeting tonight.
Sisters' Civic Action Group organizer Richard Walden told the group that Sisters "is not ignoring" the activities taking place on the corner of NW 6th and Davis, and listed ten steps the nonprofit is taking to address them, like asking people to stop violent or abusive behavior, doing conflict resolutions, talking with customers about drug use, and how that jeopardizes the organization. But Walden added, "we recognize that these activities are indicative of a much larger problem that exists in our City, State and Country."
WALDEN: "Not ignoring problems..."
The Old Town Neighborhood Association members agreed with Walden and were broadly supportive. But they expressed concern about the police shepherding people to outside Sisters, saying "we're not going to enforce the sit/lie ordinance there."
"Because of the police and security doing their job, that has moved a lot of this negative activity over towards Sisters," says Carl Roberts, a long term member of the neighborhood assocation, who said he owed his life to Sisters' founder Gennie Nelson. "Sisters should not be criticized for that. There is a responsibility that everybody has, to support Sisters in its mission."
Walden responded, by saying the cops only enforce the sit/lie law in response to complaints. He said: "Sisters of the Road is never going to complain about somebody homeless doing nothing more than sitting on the sidewalk. We've been against the sit/lie from the beginning, and we're still against it. We believe sit/lie has not been used for the stated institutions that were mapped out, and that it's being targeted at the homeless."
"We're still stuck with the sit/lie ordinance, and if you can ask the city to stop sending us all their problems, that's what we need," says Dave Owens, the association's public safety chair.
"I want to say how much I appreciate the level of empathy and concern in this neighborhood association," Walden added.
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"like asking people to stop violent or abusive behavior, doing conflict resolutions, talking with customers about drug use, and how that jeopardizes the organization."
How does that conversation go?
SoR: Excuse me, could you please stop committing crimes for drug money? It makes up look bad.
Patron: Oh, my bad. Won't happen again.
Problem solved!
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