LOITERING ORDINANCE

What is loitering, anyway?

Woe is the poor bureaucrat whose job it is to write this chapter of the municipal code. Not quite all loitering definitions are as comically tautological as New York's ("A person is guilty of loitering when he: loiters"), but almost all of definitions evidence a considerable amount of struggle and provoke a very basic question: how can such vague language be enforceable? (To say nothing of the murky First Amendment issues in play here.) 

Here is a sampling of some of our favorite loitering definitions, taken from ordinances around the country:

-"'loiter' means to delay or linger without a lawful purpose for being on the property and for the purpose of committing a crime as opportunity may be discovered."

--California Laws, Penal Code

http://law.onecle.com/california/penal/647.html

" a person commits the defense of loitering or prowling when he is in a place at a time or in a manner not usual for law-abiding individuals under circumstances that warrant a justifiable and reasonable or immediate concern for the safety of persons or property in the vicinity."

--Legal definition of loitering in Georgia

http://law.justia.com/codes/georgia/2010/title-16/chapter-11/article-2/16-11-36/

"Loitering--remaining idle in essentially one location, and includes the concept of spending time idly, to be dilatory, to linger, to stay, to saunter, to delay, to stand around and shall also include the colloquial expression "hanging around."

--Township committee of the Township of Barnegat, Ocean County, New Jersey

http://www.barnegat.net/GeneralCodes/Loitering.pdf

"If a person is said to be loitering, it means that he/she is standing around idly, delaying, wandering around, remaining, or tarrying in a public place."

--Colorado state's definition of loitering  

http://www.courts.state.co.us/Courts/Education/Youth/Laws.cfm

“Loiter: to idle, stand, remain, tarry or collect, gather or be a member of a group or crowd of people who are gathered together on any commercial or public premises (a) without conducting any lawful business or communication with the owner or operator thereof or (b) having completed such business or commencement, to remain on such premises an unreasonable length of time where prohibited by signs or after having been directed to leave by such owner, operator or authorized agent or a police officer."

--City of District Heights, Maryland's definition of loitering

http://mysite.verizon.net/vze2zdg7/sitebuildercontent/sitebuilderfiles/dhordinance07-02.pdf

"Loitering defined...F. Returns, for no apparent lawful business or purpose, to the same public or private property from which the person was asked to leave within the previous 24 hours."

--City of Glenarden, Maryland's definition of loitering

http://ecode360.com/11473692

"Loiter- To sit, stand, loaf, lounge, wander or stroll in an aimless manner or to stop, pause or remain in an area for no obvious reason."

--Village of Albany's definition of loitering

http://www.albanywi.org/uploads/images/chapter_173.pdf

PRIVATE PROPERTY

Seen in the sidewalk this morning in Brooklyn Heights:

CONTRACT BUYER

Here's a great website about the Contract Buyers League, a collective of African American Chicago homeowners originating in North Lawndale on Chicago's West Side, who, in the late 1960s protested the exploitative sale of homes to blacks through contract selling. It has a lot of great information and links, including a really high-resolution residential security map of Chicago, and a cool documentary we had never seen called Blacks and Jews that examines the relationships and conflicts between Black and Jewish activists. Check it out!

BOULDER

Ah the land use battles of the very rich. . . To add to our list of benign objects reappropriated as parking deterrents, which includes FIRE ZONES, FAKE SIGNS, FIRE HYDRANTS, DUNES, and over-zealous RESIDENTIAL PARKING PERMIT PROGRAMS, we can, thanks to Steven Segal and his HOA battle, add BOULDERS.

PARK

Like the woman in this article who runs the nonprofit organization that advocates for the rights of those convicted of sex crimes, we acknowledge that sex offenders are not a popular part of society. But building pocket parks for the explicit purpose of driving registered sex offenders out of a neighborhood is kind of messed up. As the article reports, State law prohibits sex offenders from living within 2,000 feet of a park or school: by building the park, a community could effectively force sex offenders to leave. Los Angeles is building three - two of them in the community of Wilmington, which apparently has become something of a dumping ground for sex offenders thanks to its lack of parks and schools. 

In fairness, the core of the problem is the State law itself, whose restrictions have "resulted in a proliferation of group homes in acceptable areas that house large numbers of them." But it's important to  remember that sex offenders 1) have to live somewhere, and 2) have certain constitutional rights. 

Where will they live? The article quotes Councilman Joe Buscaino, who, in classic NIMBY spirit, said that he isn't sure, but that he would like them to leave his district. 

CURB CUT

Here's one more arsenal-related observation about Florida's The Villages: interestingly, most residential neighborhoods in The Villages lack curbs:

In fact, with the exception of the gravel patch in the foreground (which has a fire hydrant placed strategically on it) there is not an inch of road frontage on this street that is not a curb cut for a driveway. It's actually quite ingenious, in a Dr. Evil kind of way. We have seen how FIRE HYDRANTS, FIRE ZONES, and RESIDENTIAL PARKING PERMITS can be used to keep non-residents out of a residential neighborhood by restricting parking, but not building curbs is actually a much simpler, much more straightforward weapon for this. Not only is there no place to park - there is no place to even pull over and rest. It's bound to make any visitor feel like a 21st century Flying Dutchman.

The Blockbuster

While we're on the topic of weapons of exclusion and inclusion in pop culture, check out this fascinating All in the Family episode about blockbusting:

It's a very interesting episode, and in Part II, Meathead does a decent job of describing the blockbusting game. On the other hand, the episode's racial dynamics are pretty messed up. It is unfortunate, for example, that the writers chose to make the blockbuster black. With a black blockbuster, the lesson of the episode is that it is wrong to exploit your own people. The black man takes the heat, and the primarily white audience of the show is relieved of having to confront the racial injustice that is at the heart of blockbusting, and the essential truth revealed by the Kerner Commission just four years before this episode aired, namely, that "white society is deeply implicated in the ghetto. White institutions created it, white institutions maintain it, and white society condones it." This racial dynamic is only reinforced at the end of the episode, when Archie Bunker goes out to rally the neighborhood to not sell out and be duped by the black man.

TV Nation - The "Public" Beaches of Greenwich, CT

"FOR SALE" SIGN BAN

Communities sometimes organize to try to ban "for sale" signs in front of homes. Why? What's interesting is that the "for sale" sign ban has been used to promote residential integration and segregation. Indeed the "for sale" sign ban is one of those ambiguous, double-agent weapons that--like ADULT SWIM, APARTMENT SIZE, NEIGHBORHOOD COMPOSITION RULE and others that remind us that how a weapon is used is often more important than what it is.

One the one hand, "for sale" signs can be (and indeed have been) used by unscrupulous, blockbusting real estate brokers to pedal panic in white neighborhoods. A big, colorful "for sale" sign in front of house signals a homeowner's decision to leave town; a cluster of such signs is likely to incite paranoia and fears of a racial turnover, which in turn incites white flight. Demand goes down, property values plummet, and said unscrupulous broker is standing by, ready to swoop in, buy up, and flip the properties to black families for twice what he bought them for. For this reason, the “for sale” sign ban is sometimes used by Civil Rights groups and integrationists: ban the sign, and you take away one of the blockbuster's chief tools. (Using the same argument, the same groups have also unsuccessfully tried to ban "sold" signs). But the "for sale" sign ban has also been used by racists to maintain or promote segregation. Especially in the pre-internet era, simple, handmade signs made it possible for people to sell homes without the aid of real estate brokers. Banning "for sale" signs makes it more necessary to go through brokers, who, with through their multiple listing service, segregated classifieds, and racist code of ethics, would ensure that a white home would not be sold to a black family and vice versa.

GATED COMMUNITY, FAKE

We recently took a field trip to Florida's The Villages, officially the largest retirement community in the world. The Villages is fascinating for many reasons, but here we'd like to focus on one particularly Arsenal-worthy reason, namely, that fact that it is essentially fake GATED COMMUNITY. 

Now there are a lot of fake things in The Villages. There are fake train stations:

fake shipwrecks:

fake histories:

and trompe l'oeil around every corner:

On Lake Sumter (a man-made lake), there is even a fake lighthouse!

That is to say the designers behind The Villages are great at faking it. For the most part, this is fairly benign, and even a little fun (although it can at times be a bit creepy).

But here's an instance of something really sinister: it's essentially a fake gated community. Since most of The Villages is served by State and County roads, The Villages can't be a gated community, since you cannot deny access to a public road to non-residents.

Here's how The Villages gets around this. It starts with a sign that reads "The Villages Residential Entrance."

Next to the sign is a gate and security hut:

Notice that the lane on the right is for residents while the lane on the left--nearest the security booth--is for visitors.

Again, this is a public road. How can this exist?

Basically, the whole thing is an elaborate hoax meant to make outsiders think it's a gated community (and thereby turn around): the gate opens automatically regardless of what lane you're in, and the guard has no authority to deny access to anyone (although he could presumably alert The Villages security to the infiltration of anyone who might look like they don't belong). 

The Arsenal of Exclusion at Boston's Urbano Project

Interboro is beyond honored that Urbano in Boston chose our forthcoming book on exclusion and inclusion in the built environment as its 2012 - 2013 theme. From their website: "Urbano's 2013 project theme is Narratives of Exclusion: Racial and Cultural Boundaries in the Urban Landscape, inspired by architect and urban planners Interboro Partners' recent book The Arsenal of Exclusion & Inclusion. Interboro Partners' Dan D'Oca, Tobias Armborst, and Georgeen Theodore explore ways in which urban design and architecture influence culture and relationships, and how urban planners can challenge segregation, exclusion, and boundaries between communities."

Join Urbano on Saturday, July 28 for an interactive cross-genre summer literary slam! You can find more about the event here.

If you are in Boston please go to this event and support this amazing organization. 

Arsenal of Exclusion & Inclusion in Mashable

Interboro and the Arsenal of Exclusion & Inclusion are featured in this article about income inequality in Mashable.

Edward T. "Ned" Coll

Here's a great piece in the History News Network by our pal Andrew W. Kahrl on Edward T. "Ned" Coll, an amazing, unsung hero of open cities everywhere. We highly recommend this reading in advance of your July 4th celebrations!