I've been covering the fortunes and travails of "The Dense Fruitcake That Is Arcata," California at Rosenblog for some time. The hippie and homeless haven - on the state's north coast, through Redwood country - has been getting in touch with its Inner Republican. This is thanks to the reprehensible conduct of the entitled classes, and a city council hopelessly mired in an Ur-60s mentality.

Today's (Eureka) Times-Standard reports on Arcata Endeavor, a non-profit that runs the well-known Arcata Services Center downtown, where all "needy" comers can get a hot lunch, shower, computer access and advice on working the social services system. The article's focus is the Center, so it's not surprising there's only a passing reference to the "sometimes tense debate about homelessness in Arcata."

But that tension - over Arcata's "homeless" - is the real story. Some local observers believe it arises from Arcata's commissars of entitlement, namely several manipulative activists and a local politician who play to the drifting homeless hippie youth known as "drainbows." This latter contingent has traditionally been drawn to Arcata by good weather, plus a (now justifiably diminishing) reputation for "tolerance," public space in which to sleep, the service center, and of course, the top attraction: sticky "bud," or primo Humboldt County grow-op marijuana, some of the very, very best around.

An Arcata city task force on homelessness recently completed its work, made especially painful by the antics of several homeless members of the body, who've tended to see a conspiracy around every corner.

In the end, each of the three homeless representatives left the task force table. One was removed by the council last month. The other two resigned on Thursday.

”My name will not be on this kind of oppression,” said former homeless representative Tad Robinson, leaving his seat and stepping to the back of the room where several people stood clapping so loudly that (clergy representative and acting task force chair Tim) Doty called the first of the night’s several recesses.

A major point of contention for several speakers was the plan did not include the development of an “autonomous” campground for what some people described as “urban campers.”

The ongoing drama has led one prominent local journalist to let loose. The editor of the exceedingly tolerant, always bemused and picaresque local weekly newspaper, The Arcata Eye, has finally reached the end of his rope with the town's commissars of entitlement - including the bombastic homeless advocate Robinson, and a key elected enabler of Arcata's sweeping civic misdirection and laxity, Council Member Dave Meserve. Arcata Eye Editor Kevin L. Hoover writes in the current edition:

The verbal assaults are applied en masse or individually, and no quarter of town is spared the vituperative venom. One day, a few months back, Robinson was lingering at the entrance of a downtown business, smoking in the posted no-smoking zone, when the female co-proprietor showed up with some heavy merchandise to carry in. She asked Robinson if he would move down the way a bit, a civil request to which he responded with his usual rap about how she must be against the homeless, capping the tirade by calling this working woman "bigot bitch." Lovely, eh?

Right on schedule, Robinson was at the next City Council meeting, waving a Bible around and preaching about how we all ought to live like Jesus - you know, like he does.

.....And the mob tried to rule inside as well. Wednesday's council meeting was repeatedly disrupted by people not willing to respect the council, the people or the democratic process. As one guy refused to stop speaking about homelessness, Mayor (Michael) Machi called a recess and summoned police.

So there were the poor cops, looking so out of place in the lobby, drawn into a political situation and taken off the streets, there to keep the so-called activists from behaving like petulant children. Meanwhile, Robinson and his pals gleefully high-fived each other (literally) for having again engineered yet another confrontation, where they where they could pose as the valiant freedom fighters against the police state.

If you like this situation, thank Dave Meserve. He catalyzes, nourishes and encourages these people to ever-lower depths of public obnoxiousness, rewarding them for it. And just wait until he gets his campground. Between that, the sticky bud and the camper-bedraggled forest, Arcata will become this continent's Great Attractor for the howling Tads of the world.

In the olden days, travelers used different tactics to bilk the rural townsfolk. Maybe they sold snake oil, or ran confidence games, selling you band uniforms and even 76 trombones. But today's state-of-the-art grifter works a different, much more rewarding con - they find an ambitious politician like Meserve and regale him with righteous rhetoric. And a light bulb goes on in his head. He'll be their shepherd and they'll be his flock. He'll set them up in a campground, they'll use the address to register to vote, and not only will he (be) a career officeholder, but other similarly configured pols will be elected and form a majority bloc. And then...

To minimize interference while they ramp up the effort, Meserve's agents push our liberal community's buttons. And it's oh so easy. All they have to do is call themselves homeless and oppressed and question our values, and we, the unsuspecting bleeding heart rubes, go all a-twitter with guilt and confusion.

By and large, Arcatans are the kind of people who won't tolerate intolerance, and who insist on compassionate assistance to the poor. The predatory types have turned this open-hearted tradition into a loophole, and use it to play the locals. No one wants to be an oppressor, or ignore a community problem, or marginalize the homeless, and being accused of that kind of thing throws us off balance.

Current and former residents posting at Hippie.com's "Hippie Haven" bulletin board on Arcata are highly critical of the town's underclass. (In the interest of anthropological verity, I am leaving their spelling and typing as is, although some of the selected posts are edited for brevity).

1)...I lived in Arcata for 7 years where I alowed the land to heal me from the inside out. I am still involved with the community there(MATEEL) and with birth activisim, however, when I gave birth to my first child I decided that the rift/raft was too intense for me, cheesy street people persistant, and to me scary as a mom....CALIFORNIA is overated, property is too expensive, and it''s unfortunate for me to hear that parents are worried about their kids out there. REST ASSURE YOURSELF they won''t go hungry @ that food bank! which is keeping all of the street kids fed well. Peace out to all my SPIRITUAL MENTORS. Peaceful states of minds to all seekers. Much LOVE and RESPECT

2) This is a great community. Unless you are a low life scum bag that begs change instead of getting a job. The towns folk are tired of the flood of "bums by choice". Usually freindly inhabitants of this little jewel are making drastic changes to get rid of the human waste that flows into town. Hope all you hippy dippies can either contribute to Arcata or go somewhere else. Everything is not FREE and that includes the buds!!!!!!!!!!!!

3)...f*** those kids, when i lived in arcata they just wanted to crash on my floor and eat my food. ive seen them stand in front of a car with a mom and four kids in it and scream at her for almost running them over, when they were standing in the road arguing with each other.

4)...I love Arcata, I''ve lived here for 12 years. Please, I do welcome all of you that wanna come here for school, to raise your kids, get out of suburbia, etc. BUT...if you''re thinking of coming here because you have no money and hear it''s an easy ride,...I will do my best to personally drive you out of what used to be my personal haven...thanks for ruining it you lazy, trustfunding, wookies...

And...please...do not call these gutter punks ''hippies''---so far from it. I was raised in a grateful dead family in the bay area in a scene where the hippies were true...they contributed to the betterment of all. Far from what we see on our plaza these days.

For all of you f***s that keep recommending camping in our protected environments---GET A CLUE!!!! It''s hardly ''green'' to destroy this beautiful landscape with these ''freaks'' trash and (...human feces), littering what was once pristine. NO, you cannot camp in our community forest---and, ranger bob is not ''evil'' for preventing you from doing so. Stay out of our marsh---which is a huge preserved area that is being destroyed by drainbows, and should be (and has been in the past) an environment for study for many of the wildlife, biology, watershed, etc...depts. for students. THANKS! So ''kind'' of you to destroy some of the last vestiges of protected land on the west coast. How ''conscious'' of you...

When your broke and spanging on the plaza, PLEASE think twice about breaking in and stealing from our struggling small businesses...sorry that you aquired a heroin addiction on your visit to the redwoods, but these struggling folks don''t deserve to pay for it---esp. since you ruined their source of clientele by driving all the decent folks out of the area...

get real, what was once a utupia is now sapped dry from greedy folks like yourself, that are looking for a kind place to freeload...that''s a big difference from free-living...so step off...

5) My son, david, is tree sitting in the Redwoods. We heard from him for the first time in 3 weeks today. If you see him, tell him HI and to call us again sometime soon. He left high school to travel and has been in Arcata for about a month now. He too decided he had enough of people telling him what to do and wanted to travel and see the country. I just hope that he realizes that someday he has to actually grow up. He thinks that "sticking it to the man" is the way to go for now. How interesting that by doing that he is still accepting handouts, food stamps and welfare. How is that being independent? He is accepting things to survive from the same "crappy government" that he wants to rail against.

The homeless task force's now-completed draft plan will be the subject of a community meeting on August 25th, and the city council is expected to approve their own version of the blueprint sometime thereafter. One possible measure is that Endeavor's homeless service center may be moved away from downtown Arcata.

I think what Arcata needs, along with tighter non-profit charity intake standards and some level of social services for the truly needy, is: beefed-up municipal ordinances against panhandling, breaking and entering, unpermitted camping on public lands, and public defecation; actual enforcement of said laws; plus more local jail cells and police. If the latter two require new revenue sources, let voters decide. Local businesses might find it cheaper in the end, taxing themselves to pay for restoration of public order.

In any event, the propertied classes of Arcata can be expected to defend their interests more and more energetically against the Trustafarian "drainbows" who are "spanging" for spare change and sticky bud, trampling marshes, crapping in the woods, and verbally abusing townsfolk and social services volunteers.

More power to the bourgeoisie of Arcata. Arcata represents, in microcosm, the plight of many much larger American cities today, including my home of Seattle. The people who play by the rules always seem to pay, and pay, and pay, for those seeking shortcuts.

TO COMMENT: The regular comment feature is not in operation now. However, you can e-mail me your comments on this post, at the address under "Contact," above. I'll add them, here.

Greg Wallace: As a graduate of Humboldt State, I could see things headed this way back in 1974. It's interesting and only a little amusing to watch from afar and see things pan out the way they are. Oh, well. You reap what you sow. It's hard to feel sorry for anyone in that mess now when we saw it coming 30 years ago.

Posted by Matt Rosenberg at August 15, 2005 11:22 AM

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