Anne McCandless wrote: I for one, wish that our parks could be open to anyone all day and night. Unfortunately, the world has people in it that make this impossible. As we all know by now, there are simply not enough police officers around to patrol everywhere all the time. Add the 'cover of darkness' to the synario,
and the possible hazards are increased even greater. John, you and your friends picked a spot which has been the site of some especially horrific events including homicide. On the lighter side, it has also been the site of some really loud and heck-raising parties which the neighbors can attest to. Add to the mix, the possiblity of drinking and swimming and the police cannot ignore closing times. If the police allow you and our friends to stay and/or go without a ticket, they cannot enforce the law with the more serious infraction of the swimmers up the beach. Mark Anderson replies: You know, this is just nuts. We've been talking about the nanny state; this is much worse than the smoking ban. Why aren't people allowed to accept risks in their own lives? We are allowed to accept risks in many other aspects of our lives -- people ride motorcycles, not to speak of bicycles on the downtown streets, we eat all sorts of bad food and don't exercise enough; we can even avoid getting appropriate health care if we're considered competent. So why can't we frequent areas with no police protection? And I don't believe it's all so dangerous anyway. I'm sure there are many city streets more dangerous at night than any park in the city, even though these streets are theoretically protected by the cops and are perfectly legal to walk on. I think I can remember years ago hearing that it was illegal to swim on beaches that didn't have a lifeguard. That concept only seems to have been abandoned recently because of money constraints on hiring lifeguards. This sort of thing doesn't affect me so much anymore now that I'm old and normally in bed when the sun goes down. But I can remember in my friskier days when this sort of thing really ticked me off, and enforcement of these petty regulations made me think of cops as the bad guys. Mark V Anderson Bancroft REMINDERS: 1. Be civil! Please read the NEW RULES at http://www.e-democracy.org/rules. If you think a member is in violation, contact the list manager at [EMAIL PROTECTED] before continuing it on the list. 2. Don't feed the troll! Ignore obvious flame-bait. For state and national discussions see: http://e-democracy.org/discuss.html For external forums, see: http://e-democracy.org/mninteract ________________________________ Minneapolis Issues Forum - A Civil City-focused Civic Discussion - Mn E-Democracy Post messages to: mailto:[email protected] Subscribe, Un-subscribe, etc. at: http://e-democracy.org/mpls
