By Jeremy Lybarger
Jane Warner Plaza — the parklet at the intersection of 17th, Castro, and Market Streets — has gotten a lot of bad press since opening in 2009. First, people complained about the nudists who congregated there to lounge bare-assed on public seating (no matter that you could count the number of nudists on one hand). After Supervisor Scott Wiener waged a scorched earth campaign against public nudity two years ago, people started bitching about the street kids who usurped the nudists and proved to be much less peaceful. Last month, the outcry got so cacophonous — encompassing street kids, domestic animals, and miscellaneous other bad apples — that the plaza closed for redesign.
Now, the Bay Area Reporter confirms that two of the plaza’s planter beds will be downsized due to frustration over activities around (and on) them. The planter fronting the entrance to the Chevron gas station, as well as the one near Twin Peaks bar, will be liposuctioned at a cost of $55,000. Andrea Aiello, executive director of the Castro/Upper Market Community Benefit District, told the B.A.R. that the city hasn’t yet determined how it will pay for the procedure, nor when it will happen.
The downsizing is welcome news for community watchdogs who are tired of seeing the planters double as toilets, storage bins, couches, and mini vice districts overrun with drugs and alcohol. In an email to B.A.R., Aiello wrote, “There is really bad behavior from the people who sit there all day long, calling people ‘faggot,’ fighting with each other. They do not clean up after themselves.” The planter near the Chevron station was especially contentious. Some neighbors called for the parklet to close permanently, a measure Supervisor Wiener opposed.
The downsizing of the planters is part of a larger overhaul of the parklet that will presumably make it less desirable for undesirables. At a heated community meeting last month, Supervisor Wiener reiterated that the city wasn’t targeting homeless people but anyone committing “bad behavior” in the plaza — for example, the man who enjoyed brandishing his crossbow there. Other complaints focused on panhandling, fights, public intoxication, urination, and run-of-the-mill loitering. “The city is under assault by people who are out of control,” one concerned citizen frothed. (Community meetings, like the Internet, are bonanzas of groundless hyperbole).
An aide for Scott Wiener told the B.A.R. that the supervisor is working on a list of bad behaviors that will elicit citations from the SFPD. Whatever Wiener’s assurances to the contrary, I doubt these concerns will be especially sympathetic to the homeless. Referring to the community meeting about the plaza, Kenneth Bunch, an ex-Sister of Perpetual Indulgence, told B.A.R., “The atmosphere was extremely venomous toward the homeless.” Let’s hope Jane Warner Plaza doesn’t become just an empty monument to police zealotry.
[via Bay Area Reporter; photo courtesy of torbakhopper/Flickr]
Got a tip for The Bold Italic? Email tips@thebolditalic.com
