A-Infos (en) north bay skate protest: fighting for our right to skate (fwd)

[<someguy@northernroots.com>]

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URL: sk8.northernroots.com

The North Bay Skate Protest :
                  Fighting for our right to skate
  

    To most people in this world, skateboarders and inline skaters are
judged as criminals.  For this reason many building owners see the
presance of skaters as a bad image for their company.  On Tuesday, May 
12th, 10 to 20 North Bay local skaters tried to change that view by
raising awareness. 

    May 12th was not just another day for the North Bay skate community,
it was a very important day, even before we knew that we were going to
protest.  It was the last day we would be able to skate at the place we
called home for most weekends and weeknights, City Hall.  All the other
skate spots were either being polluted with "no skating" signs or they
were there since last year. The North Bay area was breaking down on
skating as if it was a crime, and they were breaking down hard.  City Hall
was the last "legal" place to skate. And one day a  City Hall
worker told us that, "...on May 12th you guys will be out of here...".  I
could not believe my ears. 

    Just days later an unorganized protest was forming for the very day it
would be illegal to skate there, May 12th.  As the day neared, the protest
seemed unorganized with very few people interested in going.  Before we
knew it, it was May 12th.  That morning about 10 people showed up at the 
front of City Hall with about 300 awareness flyers and some cheap "Honk if
you believe we are not criminals" and "Where are we supposed to skate
now?" signs.  The local Newspaper company, The Nugget, showed up around
11:00 and the local television station, MCTV, showed up soon after.  Both
organizers, Ryan Grant and Darren Hogan, talked to the major, Jack
Burrows.  As quoted in The Nugget he clearly does not know what is going
on, "He [Burrows], is not aware of any threats to fine those trespassing
on the grounds."  Also he does not realize what time we skate, after hours
and on weekends when City Hall is closed, "We have people accessing city
hall to pay bills and such, and we wouldn't want to see anyone get hurt.". 
Later The Nugget talked to Melinda Seguin, the special events co-ordinator 
of the city's tourism and recreation department.  She told The Nugget that
it would cost, "...about $150,000...", but I have never heard of a local
skate park more then $50,000, (not including land), this is just a simple
excuse.  "We're certainly not ignoring their requests.", said Seguin.  Of
coarse she is lying, sense it's been over 2 years that they have been
telling us that they are going to build the park.  At around 12:30, I
(Marcus Baranow) showed up with money and 50 more flyers. By this time
there was about 20 skaters holding up signs, giving out flyers and talking
to locals walking in the downtown area.  For once we were sticking up for
ours self's in an organized manner.  By this time they had already given
out about 500 to 700 flyers and were already down to about 100.  We went
to the bank and took out another $50 and copied about 500 more flyers.  We
went to every large parking lot in the downtown area and put a flyer in
every single car. Around
2:00pm the police started to watch the area a little more then before, and 
finally one told us, "...you guys can't be giving the people in cars
flyers...", we just told them we were aloud to and they respond with,
"...well if you get in trouble don't blame me...".  Of coarse we did not
get into trouble for exercising our right to raise awareness.  The protest
went on, it was a lot of fun and I felt proud of my fellow skaters. 

    A workshop on May 23 has been planned by the city and all North Bay
has been invited to plan out the park.  I believe that we made a
difference by raising awareness and now we have dates for the making of
the skate park, and before we did not.  And to The Nugget and MCTV, once
again you did a crappy job reporting the facts. 


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