The Observation Deck

I sprinted to the bus stop needlessly this morning. It was a waste of sprint

Perhaps we can place Porta-Johns at all of our major intersections and combine toilet-training with proper street crossing instruction.

I'm just getting up to speed on events that occurred while I was on vacation last week.....

But this thread struck me as somewhat ironic. Public urination in Lakewood is certainly contrary to ANY community standards. And while this was occurring in Lakewood, I was in the backwoods of Northern Ontario. Nobody there was particularly troubled by urinating on trees.....

It's probably a geography thing.

Jeff

Bill,

I don't think the problem is the lack of public toilets. I have seen people walk out of a bar with plenty nice clean toilets to urinate in the parking lots.

In fact it is hard in Lakewood to walk much more than a block without running into a store/restaurant/bar where you can use the facilities if you are desperate.

You are right Suzanne, there is a difference between this behavior and the newer day time urination. But I still venture to guess that the lion's share of public urination occurs around the bars at night. (Not that I have done any scientific surveys mind you )

I do think the idea of foot patrols in the heavy bar areas would help tremendously. Particularily between the hours of midnight and 2:30 AM. There is very little problems before that time.

I know this isn't directly related to the urination problem, but do the parks here still have security guards? They did last year but I don't hear of them now? And another parent I just ran into said that she was at a RR park and they have a maintenance guy AT THE PARK all day to clean and keep an eye out. AND there taxes are lower. We can blame the hoodlums all day long, but the finger keeps going back to the city. I am sorry. We all demand more from this city instead of talking about the problems we need to see solutions!!!

While the anti-social behavior and lapsed boundary conditions of drunks relieving themselves in neighborhoods can linked to bars, I believe there has been an uptick of defecto in-your-face males marking territory. At the same time ignorant, ill-mannered people and psychiatric caseload of a low rent district are, according to observations, doing the same in Lakewood.

It's part of infantilism run amuck in the lower depths of Northeast Ohio's postmodern dog and pony show.

Last year, for example, at Main Library's Arthur Avenue, a patron complained about a teenage punk urinating on the side of the building. He was caught and privileges revoked. In another incident, also at Main Library, a mother from Cleveland allowed her young son to relieve himself outside. She was reprimanded.

These were firsts in my 23 years at Lakewood Public Library.

Kenneth Warren

I'm not sure if there are security guards, but I have seen maintenance people working at the parks.

I did see an LPD officer patrolling Lakewood Park when Jennie & I were there earlier tonight, though.

I honestly don't go up there in the evenings now but heard they didn't have the security guards they used to have. If there are maintenance people at the park all day, why are the parks such a mess? You don't want to know what I heard was at Madison Park last night! Used things little kids should never see!

Justine, you should report that to the parks department!

Joe Ott wrote:Phil, I didn't make my point. What I meant is we as a society are not tough enough on people who do wrong. Whether it's a drunk driver who kills someone, a bank robber, a child molester, or just a kid acting up in school.

Just my opinion. It's worth what ya paid for it...

Fair enough. I personally think we are harder on some crimes and not enough on others, which is a twist of what you are saying but in the same vein. But we have an overburdened judicial system with the bank robbers, murderers and child molesters now. How hard should we be with public urinators? Or child molesters? Or people who don't turn their cell phones off in movie theaters? Really? Unless you are suggesting killing all criminals our system is actually pretty harsh. For felony crimes, you do the time and get out and will have a hard time getting a job, finding housing or in any way getting out of the hole you dug yourself in, which in turn usually leads to more crime. That is fairly tough, since our system says "you have paid your time for doing the crime" but in actuality "you have done your time for your crime but will never be seen as a contributing citizen again." Drug crimes will prevent most people from getting even the lowest paid jobs in the area, especially in the remaining few jobs left in the region in the service industry. How is that not tough? Beyond killing, what would be worse?

As for the public urination, maybe we need one of these:







[/img]

Justine -

there was a meeting last night about the public parks. One piece of information I found interesting is that the city uses public works as a sort of human resource pool of labor. When the city needs a school guard or somebody to move offices etc. they pull somebody from public works and the daily work takes a back seat. If you're already stretched for resources that makes it tough to get the job done. Better human resource management would help.

Suzanne

Maybe a public restroom or two in the "entertainment districts" would be helpful? I dunno. Though I do like what they have in Pittsburgh on South Carson Street in their Southside entertainment district. It's an automated pay toilet "pod." You pay a quarter, which opens the door, and you've got a little bathroom in there, extremely clean, fresh-smelling and nice. Once inside, you have a 20 minutes to do what you need to do, because if you're in it longer ... the door opens up to the public! But once you are through and vacate the unit, it automatically disinfects every square inch of the space, so that every user is guaranteed an ultra-clean bathroom.

Pretty cool, especially since someone else paid for it to be installed (because there's advertising on the outside) ...

http://www.post-gazette.com/lifestyle/2 ... 0212p2.asp

I could see one or two installed in the 'Wood, maybe in the west end, maybe in downtown.

Solution: Fine for public urination, which possibly could fall under "indecent exposure", $1000. Lakewood's reputation for hard core fines used to be nearly nation-wide, at least the perception was, if not the reality. Now is the time it should be, again.

I can see if it's a toddler, and they just happen to wet themselves, but using discretion on the part of the officers, I think with the "word" being spread around the city, it's one more item that might be curbed (no pun intended).


Mark Allan Crnolatas

There does need to be better Human Resource Management all the way around. I called four times this summer and three times talked to different people to rent the pool for my children's birthday. No one ever called back and I ended up having their party out of Lakewood.
As for public restrooms for the drunks, if we can't take care of the parks for the children, how are we going to afford to hire someone to clean public bathrooms for the drunks? I am assuming they don't even live in Lakewood or pay taxes here or they would just go home to urinate! I would much rather put the money into maintaining the parks for adults and children who live here! Do we currently arrest for public urination? I would think so. It all goes back to enforcing the laws we already should have!

Justine Cooper wrote:There does need to be better Human Resource Management all the way around. I called four times this summer and three times talked to different people to rent the pool for my children's birthday. No one ever called back and I ended up having their party out of Lakewood.

I went through the samething last year. We called five times to see about renting the pool for a party. We ended up renting one in a different city.