Posted on 10/31/2007 12:04:00 PM PDT by Diana in Wisconsin
The hundreds of thousands of people who usually flock to an annual Halloween street party here are being warned to stay home or go elsewhere after several episodes of violence in recent years.
City officials have advised would-be revelers through fliers, public service announcements and juvenile probation officers that they won't find many treats in the Castro District, home in past years to the largest Halloween happening in the San Francisco Bay area.
What they will find are hundreds of extra police officers, shuttered restaurants, stepped up sobriety checks and no bus or train service after 8:30 p.m.
"This is really a public safety decision," said Supervisor Bevan Dufty, who represents the Castro and spent the better part of a year trying to arrange an alternative city-sanctioned gathering. "I'm disappointed my message is one of, 'Please don't come.'"
The festivities started decades ago as a homegrown celebration for San Francisco's gay and lesbian community, but has drawn a scarier element in recent years. In 2002, five people were stabbed. Three years ago, someone wandered the crowds wielding a chain saw.
Last year, nine revelers were shot when a confrontation between two groups of young people erupted into gunfire, despite ramped-up security. No one has been arrested in the shooting.
"It's absolutely eerie when you are looking around seeing people, most of them not in costume, looking each other in the eye with suspicion," said Castro resident Betty Sullivan, who narrowly missed getting caught in last year's gunfire.
Sullivan said she is anxious enough about what will transpire this year that she doesn't even plan to watch from her front stoop. On Tuesday, she could hear loudspeakers and sirens, part of the city's emergency notification system, being tested from her home.
"Everybody I've talked to is pretty much on the same page I am, which is it needed not to happen," she said. "I'm like, shut it down. I don't even want to pretend it's going to be OK."
People should come to the Castro only if interacting with police is their idea of a good time, said Nathan Ballard, a spokesman for Mayor Gavin Newsom. A city-financed Web site lists dozens of other events elsewhere.
"The residents of the Castro are fed up with having a large, regional party in the Castro, and frankly anyone who thinks it's a good idea to have a large, regional event in the Castro on a weeknight needs to have their head examined," he said.
To reinforce that the welcome mat has been officially rolled up, the city arranged to have probation officers throughout the area tell their young clients that going into San Francisco will be considered a probation violation.
Some business owners were angry when the city asked them to close early on Halloween night, but 34 bars, restaurants and stores that sell liquor have since agreed, according to Dufty. He said he hopes to help organize a pub crawl or another event to make up for the money they lose.
"There will be people who come to see what's happening, but when they realize the restaurants and bars are almost universally closed, I think they will go home," he said.
Well at least he/she isn't named Albus Dumbledore.
"two groups of young people"...how quaint.
There’s so many freaks of nature in that place on any given day, how would Halloween be much different?
The gay PUMPkin parade gets cancelled?....T.S.!
San Fransicko had a Halloween Steet Party?
Jeesh!!!
What with Miller Beer’s Folsom Steet Fair as perverted as that is.....
I can only imagine the twisted depths of depravity that would happen on Halloween.
“Please don’t come”?
Good Lord, you simply cannot write stuff like this.
Oh, those poor misunderstood illegal gangmembers young people. I wonder what the root causes are of their cries for help?
The freaks will not be denied.
I bet the parade will go on.
Well, root cause number 1 they live in San Francisco.
Root cause number two, they live in San Francisco....
I once saw someone dressed like a bar of soap in one of these parades. I suppose it was to focus attention on the need to clean up things. But a “bar of soap”? Wonder what would happen if the person wearing it was somehow dropped?
“I wonder what the root causes are of their cries for help?”
Sand in the lube?
Shocking, just shocking.
It is estimated that only 8 percent of the San Francisco population is homosexual. Most of the people who attend this Halloween celebration are from outside of San Francisco....it draws a lot of gang and thug elements.
They were testing it from her home?
I guess certain kids will have to skip trick or treating in Long Beach CA this year too. You might recall it was a year ago that some teen girls were attacked just because of their race. The national media managed to conveniently ignore this though.
Trust me, I’ve been there (ONCE!). The castro is scary enough on any given weekend. But on Holloween?
You’d have to see it to believe it.
I get the idea from reports out of SF that every day is Halloween there. They probably won’t be able to tell the difference if it’s canceled.
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