Help plan the future of Tire Beach!

August 7, 2007 on 9:13 pm | In local news | Comments Off on Help plan the future of Tire Beach!

The big paintout last weekend, and the security theater that followed, have shown that the City of San Francisco wants very much to be taken seriously in their effort to eradicate graffiti art from Warm Water Cove.

They claim to be doing this with community support.

I don’t believe that’s true.

They haven’t heard from the true community of Tire Beach: the writers, musicians, filmmakers, photographers, DJs, dancers, fringe artists, and fans who have collectively spent more time in that park than anyone else. These are the people whose watchful eyes made it a relatively safe place to be, despite unpleasant conditions and utter neglect from the city. And these are the people who, against all odds, turned this smelly armpit of a park into a place of thriving grass-roots culture. You, dear reader, may be one of these people. And the city hasn’t heard from you.

The good news is, the plan for the future of Warm Water Cove is not yet set in stone. The planners are asking for input from the community (remember, that’s you!) before they make a final proposal. Even better, we have a deadline: if we don’t speak our minds by September 25th, we’ll miss our chance.

Of course, we don’t want to just whine at them. It’s better if we can talk amongst ourselves first, and come up with some kind of coherent plan to bring back the art. Dav Yaginuma has created a discussion group so we can do that. If you have any opinion at all, please join the group. Got a great idea? Share it. Think it’s impossible? Tell us why! Even if you don’t have much to add, join anyway! Numbers can carry a lot of weight.

I’m not taking charge of this effort, or promising to see it through to any specific goal. Heck, I might wake up tomorrow and decide it was all a waste of time. But I feel that at the very least, those who care about the art need to be heard. If that’s you, go ahead and join the group, and let’s make some stuff happen!