To drive home exactly who the city is allowing to live in our
community and is building facilities for on 3rd Street at Rose:
As I was walking past Gusta yesterday
at 11am on a sunny Saturday morning, just a little over a block
from where me and my partner live, a homeless man suddenly
rushed up to me and thrust his middle finger in my face and said
'fucking faggot, you're the faggot we beat up last year, and you
better watch it faggot we know where you live!'
And then raced
off to the mess of the 3rd Street encampment. I was stunned,
shocked, and terrified.
Twenty-four hours later the whole thing seems
surreal, happy couples getting lunch at Gusta, people headed to
Gold's for a workout, while at the intersection of 3rd and
Sunset I'm being gay bashed and physically threatened. And going
through my head is the fact that the city is in the process of
giving people like this a permanent home in my community. I will
now fear every time I go to Gold's gym or head over to Gusta for
a sandwich that this guy is watching me, this guy may come at me
again, and maybe this guy will decide to follow me home.
As some of you on this string may
recall, I was assaulted as my partner and I walked our dogs down
3rd less than a year ago.
In my 25 years of living on the west
side of Los Angeles I had never been physically or
verbally threatened for my sexuality, yet now, twice in less
than a year, one block from our home, this has happened by the
homeless occupiers on 3rd.
The city and Mike Bonin condone and
facilitate these people living in our midst and threatening our
way of life, our values, and our very existence.
The people we put in power, the
people we pay tens of thousands of dollars in taxes to, do
nothing to protect us, and in fact take our resources to
facilitate the occupation of our neighborhood by people that
threaten and assault us.
Mike, I call on you not as a fellow
gay man (although I assume you have felt the same fear of such
threats in your own life), but as an elected official who is
responsible for your constituents' safety. I ask you to
responsibly and quickly address the homeless situation in Venice and to
responsibly spread the resources of the city not only in
addressing the short-term issues of safety, but the long-term
issues of the distribution of homeless solutions across the
entire city, not predominantly in Venice at the expense of the
life and safety of the citizens who live here for your own political expediency.
I've had to live in some rough
neighborhoods in my life, but never in my life have I been so
scared to walk out my own front door. Please do more and please
do it now, before I or someone else gets really hurt.
