I hate to disagree with B. Rahe and S. Sherrard (Peninsula Beacon, July 5) but the proposed alcohol-free “family” zones would be ineffective public policy. This would not justly serve the public interest and would lead us down a slippery slope toward a total beach alcohol ban, or worse.
Experience should have taught my friends Craig and Julie Klein that half-measures avail us nothing. Limiting the hours of consumption, banning alcohol on the seawall and putting a private trailer in the public parking lot as a “test-pilot program” (Julie Klein, Beacon Aug. 26, 1999) have not been an “effective tool for the police to use in cracking down on crime” (Craig Klein, Beacon June 28). What makes us think that segregated beaches will?
Perhaps there’s a hidden agenda at work here. It appears as more than a coincidence that the proposed “Family Fun Zones” (FFZ) overlay the intersection of the business districts with the beach.
Julie Klein, a longtime vice president with the Ocean Beach MainStreet Association, has worked tirelessly in the interest of the local business community from a law-and-order/family values perspective. What about the beach residents and beach visitors? Where’s the justice, being treated to less than an FFZ?
So, even if we “at least try an alcohol-free zone” as another test-pilot program, it will only be a matter of time before there’s a demand to expand the FFZ. After nearly eight years of having the OBMA trailer on our parking lot, our experience suggests it’s just another nose under the tent. But why stop there? I suggest that in order to secure “a place where children can play without being affected by … alcohol,” we declare the entire city of San Diego to be an FFZ, ban the consumption of alcohol in all public places, monitor the people with video cameras, require FFZ permits and have {officers} police the FFZ. If that additional work is too much for our meager civic resources, we can outsource police functions to private security firms.