SabrinaSpiher.com: A Media Empire

Another blogger rants about the South Side and our clueless Councilperson.

SabrinaSpiher.com: A Media Empire: "here's Bruce Kraus harassing the businesspeople of the South Side for selling food on the sidewalks - horrors! Apparently, he's been getting constituent complaints about messy drunks at 3:00 a.m. It is achingly obvious that these constituents are old. I am 100% certain that the young people who are spending $100,000 to colonize the ugly little aluminum siding box houses around East Carson are not concerned about the 3:00 a.m. drunks - in fact, they came for that atmosphere. I have a better solution than trying to put the poor chicken-on-a-stick guy out of business: if you don't like the South Side, move. You're ugly little box house will sell for 18 times what you paid for it in nineteen ought eight, and you'll be in good shape to head out to a ranch home in Edgewood, or wherever old people like to live. Meanwhile, the city won't waste its time and energy making one of its most appealing spots less appealing to the people they're constantly claiming they want to appeal to: young people. Lord!

I do not agree with Kraus -- nor with the blog posting above for a few reasons. Sure, constituents are going to complain. Sure, some are old. But, many are not.

Our drunk problem isn't at 3 am. Rather it is from midnight to 2:15 or so. Mostly the worse as the bars close around 1:30 to 2 am.

But, the aftermath of the crowds presents another problem that surfaces about 7 am as it gets light and the trash lingers. The drunks are gone. The bouncers are gone. The rented beer is spent an returned to 'Mother Earth' too. But, those that have jobs and lives to lead are seeing the remains.

Frankly, I didn't move here for the South Side bar atmosphere. Wrong. This is a neighborhood, a mixed neighborhood with churches, schools, institutions, families, single folks, seniors, recreation, business, retail, history, eating/drinking and the flexibility/freedom to make yourself here without the burden of conformity's pressures.

The option of moving, if we don't like the South Side, has been done thousands and thousands of times already. The one's that are here now are the cranky types that are going to stay because of the principle of things -- or -- because of their lack of capcity to move.

If the South Side turns into an entertainment district to the detriment of everything else, then the city will die. Dead. Bankrupt. Worse than Detroit. Not just the neighborhood, but the entire city, and in turn, the region.

Frankly, the South Side has done well for itself because the government types have stayed out of the South Side, by and large. The Local Development officials can't move their way out of a wet paper bag. The URA is only something most on the South Side know about from reading the newspapers.

We do not need the city and Mr. Kraus of city council working, as said in the blog post, to make the South Side appealing. But, things need to occur for other motivations, without the city. And, selling food on a stick under a sidewalk umbrella to midnight with a three-block litter patrol from 12 to 3 am (by the same business people) would be a great next step.

In the end, you might want to buy a house here -- as there are dozens of them available up and down our streets now. And, to make that investment, insurances need to be understood so it is a great long-term location. Better than South Park and Shaler, even after your children grow to their tenth birthday.