Thread: TEMECULA, CA: WANTS TO SHUT DOWN PUBLIC PROTESTS

TEMECULA: Proposed ordinance focuses on protests

If approved, protesters could be responsible for city costs

By AARON CLAVERIE - Staff Writer | Saturday, April 11, 2009 7:07 PM PDT ∞

TEMECULA, CALIFORNIA ---- Sign-carriers and slogan-shouters who gather at a heavily trafficked street corner in Temecula to protest the cause of the day could find themselves stuck with a bill for fire safety and traffic control.

A provision giving the city the legal backing to recoup those expenses has been woven into a proposed parades and special events ordinance that was recently approved by a divided Planning Commission.

If the City Council approves the ordinance next month, groups of 75 people or more would be required to secure a special event permit before legally staging an event and the ordinance would make the permit holder responsible for paying "city support costs."

Examples of costs listed by city officials include fire safety, traffic control, pedestrian control, water safety and street closures.

There also is a provision in the ordinance that would require event organizers to give written notice to the city manager at least 24 hours before a "spontaneous event" ---- a gathering or assembly defined as any event involving expressive activity that is sparked by news or public affairs.

The city manager, according to the ordinance, has authority to "deny permission" to conduct the event and if a manager makes a finding at least six hours before the event, the manager can propose an "alternative time, route, venue or manner of conducting the activity that would be acceptable to the city."

The Planning Commission voted 3-2 to recommend passage of the ordinance, but it tacked on comments that asked the council to figure out how the ordinance would be enforced.

Associate Planner Christine Damko said last week that the main issue commissioners raised was that the proposed ordinance "didn't have enough teeth."

Damko prepared the ordinance, modeled after similar ones in Long Beach and Santa Monica, for the commission's consideration.

She said that the council likely will consider the ordinance at its first meeting next month, set for May 12.

Assistant City Manager Aaron Adams said Tuesday that City Attorney Peter Thorson recommended bringing the ordinance, which he helped draft, before the commission and ultimately the council.

Thorson wrote in an e-mail to The Californian that the ordinance is not just a mechanism to collect fees for city services.

It's a comprehensive set of regulations governing all aspects of the city's process for dealing with parades and special events on city streets and property, he said.

"The regulations codify the city's procedures for accepting and approving parade and special events permits ..." he wrote in the e-mail.

In recent months, Temecula's street corners have become magnets for protests.

Before and after the November election, both sides of the gay marriage debate argued their cases at heavily traveled intersections in the city.

There also were local protests tied to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict that flared up anew early this year.

The ordinances in Santa Monica and Long Beach were challenged in court by political action groups.

The Long Beach case ---- Long Beach Area Peace Network v. City of Long Beach ---- was settled, sort of, last year by the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals.

The network sued the city after receiving a $7,000 bill for police, parks and public works "departmental services."

A lower court ruled in the network's favor, calling the entire ordinance unconstitutional.

Hearing Long Beach's appeal, the circuit court ruled that only four of the nine provisions of Long Beach's ordinance were unconstitutional, upholding many of the objections raised by a lower court judge.

A particularly sticky part of Long Beach's ordinance was a provision that allowed the city to waive fees in certain cases.

The court was unmoved by the city's argument that officials would not use the anticipated content of an event as a guide when deciding whether to levy fees.

According to the ruling: "The Peace Network held two similar events, separated by less than two months, both with at least 1,000 attendees. For the February event, held before the U.S. initiated hostilities in Iraq and attended by government officials, the city assessed no fee or charges. For the March event, held after the commencement of hostilities in Iraq and not attended by government officials, the city assessed charges of $7,041. This favoritism is a manifestation of the very dangers inherent in unbridled discretion."

Temecula city officials cited the circuit court's ruling as a validation of the ordinance, noting in the Planning Commission's staff report that the Long Beach ordinance "has withstood First Amendment legal challenges in recent court cases."

Councilman Mike Naggar said Tuesday that the ordinance has been written with the Long Beach ruling in mind.

For instance, he said, the Long Beach ordinance gave the city manager leeway to decide when and how to waive fees.

Temecula's ordinance does not contain that ambiguity.

"The ordinance fixes that problem so it doesn't occur here," Naggar said.

That said, Naggar pointed to another section of the ordinance ---- the section on spontaneous events ---- that he will research before the May meeting.

Based on his first reading, Naggar said the section seems to give the city "too much control of speech."

"I plan to flesh that out at the council meeting. It's wrought with too many questions," he said.

Rick Reiss, one of the organizers of an anti-tax rally scheduled for Wednesday in Temecula, said he had heard of the commission's action.

"The notion that you would have to get permission to exercise free speech is bizarre," Reiss said.

For Reiss, the sidewalk that he will stand on next week is his, paid for with part of his tax dollars.

And he believes he has a right to stand on his sidewalk and speak his mind.

Also, the rally is being held as a sort of homage to the patriots who tossed tea into the Boston Harbor to protest taxation without colonial representation in the British parliament.

Reiss said he doesn't think any of the patriots asked for permission before deciding to caffeinate the harbor.

Contact staff writer Aaron Claverie at (951) 676-4315, Ext. 2624, or aclaverie@californian.com.

NORTH COUNTY TIMES

TEMECULA ---- Guy in Grim Reaper costume. Check.

A "Zombama" (a President Barack Obama tax zombie). Check.

"Don't Tread On Me" flags. Check.

Patriotic and anti-tax songs blaring from a boom box. Check.

And that's just the top half of the checklist that Rick Reiss has written up for an anti-tax "tea party" rally scheduled for 11 a.m. Wednesday at Temecula's Duck Pond Park.

Reiss, a member of the Murrieta-Temecula Republican Assembly, said late last week that he's got more things on the list that will be unveiled during the rally, one of numerous anti-tax events that have been scheduled across the country on tax day this year.

"We're going have at least 50 people there. This thing could end up being in the hundreds," he said, describing the wellspring of anti-tax fervor in Southwest County.

While the original Boston Tea Party Colonials dressed like Indians to throw the British off their trail, Reiss said there might be some people dressed up like Colonial patriots to hammer home the "tea party" theme.

There might also be some Uncle Sams in the group and other costumes.

"I gotta tell you, this is a grass-roots kind of thing, not a top-down, organizational-pyramid thing," he said.

The preponderance of anti-tax events this year is generally credited to conservative talk radio hosts, who have taken the "Joe the Plumber" mantra of the 2008 presidential election and scribbled it into a narrative that portrays the Democratic president of the U.S. and the Democratic Party-controlled Congress as villains hell-bent on raiding the pocketbooks and wallets of hard-working Americans.

For many people, tax day is an annual annoyance, a buzzing mosquito that is dispassionately shooed away after it gets a bit of sustenance.

But for people like Reiss and the thousands who say they plan to attend anti-tax rallies throughout the country, it's an affront, a day when all of the righteous indignation that has built up since last year's tax day ---- government waste! fat-cat lobbyists setting the national agenda! pork! earmarks! ---- explodes like a bottle of soda pop spiked with Mentos.

But wait. Isn't this year's federal tax bill just leftover codes and regulations from President Bush's administration? Won't the first Obama tax bill hit desks next year?

Adele Harrison, president of the Temecula/Murrieta Valley Republican Women Federated, said that might be the case, but California residents were hit between the eyes with a two-by-four of tax increases on April 1.

"That's what kind of put us over the edge: California's new taxes, and what we know is going to happen with Obama," she said.

To those who dismiss the protesters as disgruntled Republicans, Harrison said that's a misconception.

"A lot of people say it's nonpartisan, and I think it is. Republicans, Democrats ---- both sides are fed up with the taxes. It doesn't just hurt the wealthier people, especially the sales tax hikes. Everybody has to buy things," she said.

Harrison said there was a rumor that the event had been canceled because of lack of interest, but she said that is not the case.

"We are going to be there," she said.

Reiss said he was prepared for anyone from left-leaning organizations who might try to infiltrate the event. In preparation for that type of mischief, Reiss said he's telling people to bring a digital camera or digital video camera to document the suspect protesters so they can be outed on YouTube.

As for the number of people expected to show up, Harrison is optimistic.

"I've been talking to hundreds of people every day," she said.

Temecula Mayor Maryann Edwards said she doesn't plan to attend the event, but she is "on board" with the protesters' right to protest peacefully.

Asked about her personal feelings on the issue, Edwards said she doesn't support higher taxes. She said that the city of Temecula has shown that it's not impossible for a government entity to balance a budget.

"We (the state) have a spending problem," she said.

For those concerned about the ducks and/or the pond's filtration system, the organizers said no actual tea or tax-form debris will be thrown into the pond.

"We are looking at something that will float, something that is environmentally not a problem. Maybe wooden crates that will float with signs on it saying it's tea for a photo op. We're not putting anything in the pond," Harrison said.

Contact staff writer Aaron Claverie at (951) 676-4315, Ext. 2624, or aclaverie@californian.com.

NORTH COUNTY TIMES

OMG Obama has found out about the Tea Parties and is trying to shut them down!

the courts have ruled again and again that cities and towns cannot restrict the freedoms of free political speech and freedom to assemble etc... with excessive fines and fees.

Any group that does not want to pay these costs can get an injunction slapped on this city easy.

W