Citizen Event Commission Needed
by Harmon Seaver
August 30, 2002
note: This letter is a response to Jon Frings.
I'd like to clarify something that I said in the beginnings of this thread: I'm not at all opposed to events like Riverfest (I like music and do attend concerts - although not Riverfest - at times), the EAA airshow (in fact I used to be a member and not only went to the airshow but went everyday to as many forums as I could), or even (gag) CountryUSA. What I am opposed to, however, is the excessive noise. I noticed that when an outdoor concert facility was to be built near Minneapolis-St. Paul, the neighbors of the future facility sued to force them to build a special shell to contain the sound. And that, mind you, was a facility for classical music -- non-amplified. Any outdoor music event needs to be held in such a manner that the neighbors don't have to hear it. CountryUSA, for example, could be easily heard, every word loud and clear over a mile away. That is not acceptable, and, in truth, is criminal.
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I think it's time that a citizens commission was put together to study the costs and benefits of hosting these events and to investigate what the city's role should be -- and also to investigate why the city isn't taking care of the community's needs in other respects, such as noise, vandalism, and drunken rowdiness. |
The main point was about the costs to the community. Yes, cultural events are
desirable -- the Grand, for example, is a tremendous asset to the community.
Music events don't have to be outrageously loud, and/or they can be held inside.
But what about the other costs? I don't know where Jon Frings lives, but where
we live, we have to call the police a lot -- sometimes two or three times a
week. Aside from the fact that usually the police don't come, or if they do
they don't actually do anything useful, like ticket the drunks disturbing the
peace and vandalizing property (and besides the fact that sometimes the police
harass us for calling by calling us back at 4 AM to ask "Is everything
all right now?", which is pretty disgusting) -- one of the very serious
costs we see to the community from Riverfest, CountryUSA, or the Airshow, is
that when we call the police during those times, we are invariably told "Sorry,
all the officers are busy with EAA" -- or whatever the event is.
I'm sorry, but that's too high a price for the community to pay for ANY event.
Please don't think, however, that the answer is for the city to hire more police
-- Oshkosh has more cops per capita than most cities. The answer is for the
promoters of those events to buy their own security. They're making money off
the event, why should we taxpayers have to contribute?
Several weeks ago, we saw a gang of 15-20 youths attacking a house in our neighborhood,
breaking windows, kicking in the door, beating up the inhabitants. It took a
long, long time for the police to get there, and as far as I know they never
made any arrests even though they were told what house the gang members came
from. With things like that going on, we simply don't have the luxury of having
the OPD off somewhere listening to music or watching the airshow.
These are just some of the costs to the community. I think it's time that a citizens commission was put together to study the costs and benefits of hosting these events and to investigate what the city's role should be -- and also to investigate why the city isn't taking care of the community's needs in other respects, such as noise, vandalism, and drunken rowdiness.