{"id":8193,"date":"2003-03-27T14:08:49","date_gmt":"2003-03-27T19:08:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/localhost:8888\/2003\/03\/27\/oakland-only-appears-not-to-be-safe\/"},"modified":"2003-03-27T14:08:49","modified_gmt":"2003-03-27T19:08:49","slug":"oakland-only-appears-not-to-be-safe","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.splendoroftruth.com\/curtjester\/2003\/03\/oakland-only-appears-not-to-be-safe\/","title":{"rendered":"Oakland only appears not to be safe"},"content":{"rendered":"

Barbed wire and metal bars make Oakland’s business districts
\nlook like war zones, say city officials who want to outlaw exterior security
\ndevices that they claim are not only ugly but ineffective. <\/p>\n

"It gives a sense that our community is not a very safe city," said
\nCity Manager Robert Bobb, who has made fighting blight a top priority. "We
\nbelieve there are alternatives for securing their businesses." <\/p>\n

A City Council committee backed a plan Tuesday to prohibit barbed wire fences
\nin commercial districts but stopped short of supporting a more far- reaching
\nproposal to eliminate burglar bars, roll-down doors and retractable security
\ngates, common fixtures throughout the city. <\/p>\n

City officials said they believe Oakland is the first city in the Bay Area
\nto consider such a law, although Santa Monica has banned barbed wire. <\/p>\n

Such devices "tend to exaggerate the perception of an unsafe area or
\nwar zone," said city building services director Calvin Wong. <\/span>
\n[Full
\nStory<\/a>]<\/p>\n

Again appearance is more important then actualities. The reason
\nit looks like the community is not very safe is because of Oakland’s high crime
\nrate.
\nBusinesses
\ndon’t pick these items because they like the war zone aesthetic but
\nto protect
\ntheir businesses. Maybe they think by making it look safe it will become safe.
\nI remember the first time I went to New York City and saw all of the roll-down
\ndoors on businesses and burglar bars. I was soon taught the reason why the
\narea looked unsafe, as I was walking down the sidewalk in a crowd of people
\na junkie pulled a gun on me and demanded my wallet. Don’t let anyone tell
\nyou that New Yorkers aren’t polite. While I was being robbed in the shock I
\nhad dropped the record album I had just bought (Led Zeppelin’s Houses of the
\nHoly)
\nand the robber picked it off the ground and handed it back to me.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Barbed wire and metal bars make Oakland’s business districts look like war zones, say city officials who want to outlaw exterior security devices that they claim are not only ugly…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[24],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8193","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-punditry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.splendoroftruth.com\/curtjester\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8193","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.splendoroftruth.com\/curtjester\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.splendoroftruth.com\/curtjester\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.splendoroftruth.com\/curtjester\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.splendoroftruth.com\/curtjester\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8193"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.splendoroftruth.com\/curtjester\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8193\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.splendoroftruth.com\/curtjester\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8193"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.splendoroftruth.com\/curtjester\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8193"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.splendoroftruth.com\/curtjester\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8193"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}