Merchants Whining despite Council's repressive actions on their behalf

NOTE TO READER: Tiffany DePriest's letter fails to mention the number one reason businesses in downtown Santa Cruz have closed: high rents.  Cat and Canary, a longtime downtown business, paid $5000 per month for rent for years.  Then the landlord raised the rent to $15,000 per month.  The business closed within 2 months.  Ditto for all of the other businesses, with the possible exception of Ali Babba's whose rent was subsidized by the City.  Surely the drop in the stock market, massive unemployment in silicon valley, the Enron scandal, the Arthur Andersen accounting scandal, and other macro-economic factors have hurt businesses downtown that, because of the massive rents they must pay, do not have a wide enough profit margin to survive when there is a 15% downturn in the economy.  But Tiffany DePriest would rather aim at a much easier target:beggars and street musicians.

I'd like to ask DePriest if the stores at the Capitola Mall which due to privitization and rules which do not allow panhandlers or homeless people with backpacks near their stores are basking in the high profits such an environment offers? What? Many stores at the Capitola Mall have also closed?  How can that be?

Meanwhile, the City Council has banned sitting on the sidewalk 14 ft from a building, asking for spare change 14 ft from a building, playing a musical instrument 10 feet from a building, banned hacky-sacking, amateur bubble-blowing, and frisbees.  On January 14th, they are poised to pass an unconstitutional "move along" ordinance as well.  Far from ignoring merchants, the council is the dog that is wagged by the tail of merchant pressures, whether it makes any sense to do so or not.

--- Becky Johnson of HUFF

Homeless United for Friendship & Freedom

FROM THE SANTA CRUZ SENTINEL JAN.7, 03

Downtown next ghost town
Has anyone bothered to notice that many downtown businesses are closing? Is the city concerned? ID, Wherehouse, Volumn, Eclectix, Ali Babba’s, Jeanie Bo Beanie’s ... just to name a few.

Downtown is fast on its way to becoming a ghost town. It is all too easy to blame the economy for these closings, but ask any of these business owners and they will tell you that the situation downtown is more a result of city politics than the economy.

The city has long ignored important issues like violence, panhandling, drug dealing, vandalism, robbery and basic services like sidewalk cleaning and public facilities. Without a clean and safe environment, people won’t want to shop and businesses will have to close their doors. The City Council has tiptoed around downtown issues for too long, trying to be "PC." They have favored the needs of the vocal few to the detriment of the city as a whole. What the City Council needs to know is that there is another name for business owners and those they employ — they are people, too. They pay taxes, vote and have families to support.

Like most other downtown business owners I know, my husband and I work seven days a week and are barely able to support ourselves. We are not closing our door for good because of the economy. We are simply too tired of waiting and working for a cleaner, safer downtown — one that I’m afraid is never going to come.

Tiffany De Priest

Santa Cruz