Cities’ Patience with ‘Occupy’ Protesters Tested

(by Meghan Barr, WashingtonTimes.com) NEW YORK (AP) – Fed up with petty crime, the all-night racket of beating drums, the smell of human waste and the sight of trampled flowers and grass, police and neighbors are losing patience with some of the anti-Wall Street protests around the U.S.

In Oakland, Calif., police in riot gear fired tear gas and bean bags before daybreak Tuesday to disperse about 170 protesters who had been camping in front of City Hall for the past two weeks; 75 people were arrested.

The mayor of Providence, R.I., is threatening to go to court within days to evict demonstrators from a park.

And businesses and residents near New York’s Zuccotti Park, the unofficial headquarters of the movement that began in mid-September, are demanding something be done to discourage the hundreds of protesters from urinating in the street and making noise at all hours.

“A lot of tourists coming down from hotels are so disgusted and disappointed when they see this,” said Stacey Tzortzatos, manager of a sandwich shop near Zuccotti Park. “I hope for the sake of the city the mayor does close this down.”

She complained that the protesters who come in by the dozen to use her bathroom dislodged a sink and caused a flood, and that police barricades are preventing her normal lunch crowd from stopping by.

In Philadelphia, city officials have been waiting almost two weeks for Occupy Philly to respond to a letter containing a list of public safety and health concerns. Richard Negrin, the city’s managing director, said officials can’t wait much longer to address hazards such as smoking in tightly packed tents, camp layouts that hinder emergency access, and exposure to human waste.

“They just can’t ignore [city officials] indefinitely,” Mr. Negrin said Tuesday.

Stephen Campbell, a protester in Boston, said the troublemakers are the minority.

“We have a policy here: no drugs, no alcohol,” he said. “Us occupiers really try to stick true to that. Other people who move in, who maybe have an alcohol problem or a drug problem, you know, we’re not fully equipped to handle things like that.”

Tensions reached a boiling point in Oakland after a sexual assault, a severe beating and a fire were reported and paramedics were denied access to the camp, according to city officials, who said they had received numerous complaints of threatening behavior.

Mayor Jean Quan said the city was forced to evict the protesters after it became apparent that authorities could not maintain sanitary conditions or control vandalism. When police moved in, they were pelted with rocks, bottles and utensils from people in the camp’s kitchen area, but no one was injured.

In Minneapolis, Hennepin County Commissioner Jeff Johnson said some constituents who work downtown are getting a little tired of the piles of belongings cluttering the plaza, while others are worried about escalating costs. The sheriff’s department already has spent more than $200,000, most of that in overtime. About 100 to 150 demonstrators crowd the plaza during the day.

“At first it looked like they were having a rally or trying to make a statement, but now it just looks like a game to them. Most people don’t support that,” Mr. Johnson said.

In Atlanta, Fariyal Lakhani, owner of a kiosk next to the park where a few dozen protesters have camped out, said people aren’t buying candy bars and sodas, or they want things for free or at a steep discount. In Portland, Ore., a 7-Eleven one block from the protests reported a higher-than-normal $6,000 in shoplifted merchandise since the protest began Oct. 6. The store has since added a security guard.

Copyright 2011 The Washington Times, LLC.   Associated Press.  Reprinted from the Washington Times for educational purposes only.  Visit the website at washingtontimes.com.