Comments on: Parking Space Jockeys

By: gpliving

gpliving — Sat, 22 Sep 2007 17:36:24 +0000

Two notes:

Foxnews had a story last night on panhandling and featured the PQLiving blog.
MPD 1D Commander Groomes personally sent the blog a note that "MPD has made over 25 arrests for panhandling this past month."

By: Columbo

Columbo — Fri, 21 Sep 2007 14:20:10 +0000

PQResident is right, we’ve covered the original topic well and have now veered pretty far off course. I’m going to close this posts to comments. Thanks everyone, lets to turn our attention to the new posts on the blog.

By: pqresident

pqresident — Fri, 21 Sep 2007 13:41:08 +0000

Everybody -
We like a broad discussion and having people express a range of views…that said, let’s stay on topic please. The discussion is veering too far afield.

Thanks,
The Management

By: GotAnyRizla?

GotAnyRizla? — Fri, 21 Sep 2007 13:15:21 +0000

Not sure that I agree with #’s 27 & 32 in equating the private, personal consumption of pot with public consumption and distribution of much more dangerous narcotics.

I understand that in the United States pot use has been demonized, but in many societies it is considered the eqivalent to alcohol and is tolerated (France, Spain, UK etc).

This is not to say that pot is without downsides, and definitely lives have been ruined by pot. But so have lives and families been destroyed by alcohol, gambling, eating disorders etc.

If someone in your apartment building illegally streams a movie off the internet, or watches an illegal feed of a sporting event as he/she doesn’t want to pay the ESPN fee, is that the same as someone selling illegal, bootlegged DVDs on the street? Of course not.

Based on interpretations of UN resolutions, one could make a very powerful argument that the invasion of Iraq is “legal.” That doesn’t make it “right.” Equally, the possession and comnsumption of pot is illegal, but it doesn’t make it morally wrong.

By: Anon

Anon — Fri, 21 Sep 2007 13:02:26 +0000

# 27 and #32:

Yeah, pot is used all the time, and I too smell it in the hallways. Big deal.

Most people who live in PQ are very intelligent, hardworking, successful folks I don’t think your “Just Say No” pitch is going to work when it involves a drug that otherwise should be decriminalized if our Congress were not so insistent on maintaining antiquated and unsuccessful drug laws.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Fri, 21 Sep 2007 13:01:40 +0000

Fed up in PQ: Get used to the lack of police concern in Chinatown. My buddy was punched in the face by a drunk guy just walking down the street. My buddy’s girlfriend went over to two officers nearby and they told her that if he wasn’t bleeding or dying, they didn’t care.

By: C

Fri, 21 Sep 2007 12:16:25 +0000

Actually, I have a funny story about these guys. One night my cousin and I had to get her very drunk sister home, and that involve moving her across the street. Before I knew what she was doing, my cousin had enlisted the help of two parking space jockeys, who carried her sister across the street. They were actually very polite and good-natured about the whole thing. Of course, they turned to me when the job was done and I forked over a few dollars, since they’d actually been somewhat helpful. When my cousin questioned me about the transaction, I had to explain that there are guys on the street who try to help people with parking and other odd jobs– she’d been living in DC as long as I had and apparently had no idea they existed.

Normally, though, I find these guys very annoying. If I live in DC I already know how to find parking spaces and parallel park, thank you very much. Having someone yelling and waving their hands and me only makes parking more difficult.

By: Loofa133

Loofa133 — Fri, 21 Sep 2007 11:38:19 +0000

Fed up in PQ: Not surprising. MPD in general are lazy and incompetent. Your best bet is to call 311 and it will get classified as an assault and the boys would have had a nice chat with the MPD.

It is all about marketing the issue properly to the police. The vagrant in front of your building is not “a homeless person sleeping on your doorstep” it is “an individual trespassing on your property who will not leave after repeated attempts to confront the issue and who on occasion is harassing and assaulting the residents.”

If you are annoyed about a problem, email Adrian Fenty too. I have had very good success with him.

By: I Live in the Penn Quarter Too

I Live in the Penn Quarter Too — Fri, 21 Sep 2007 03:17:30 +0000

Mr. T,

You’re right, it’s a bit of a gray area and BID personnel are supposed to report threatening situations, but they are not there to “deter” people.

Just the act of telling people not to give the jockeys money can put them in a threatening situation. I sure wouldn’t do that. I opened my mouth once in a similar situation and nearly got assaulted. Lesson learned: Call 311.

How can you be sure that the BID person you saw standing by while a person was spewing obscenities hadn’t already called it in? If you were there for the entire incident and know for sure that they didn’t, let the BID know.

To get a better idea of what BID personnel are supposed to do, why not contact them? Better yet, go to the next Downtown Neighborhood Association meeting (Oct. 9) and raise the issue. The BID might even be there.

By: Fed Up in PQ

Fed Up in PQ — Thu, 20 Sep 2007 23:35:30 +0000

Well, I witnessed something terrible today, informed the police about it virtually 5 seconds later, and was informed that nothing could be done. I was walking by the McDonald’s at the Verizon Center and witnessed a group of male teenagers encircle a lone woman, while one of them got within an inch of ear and proceeded to scream into it. I was shaken, as was she, and walked right up to a group of police officers who were about 2 feet away to inform them about that had just occurred. The cop shrugged his shoulders and said “yeah, that happens all the time here.” And that was the extent of their involvement.