Never lived in a downtown? Grackles and pigeons are screaming, flying rats. Very easy to see how a resident would want to poison these vastly overpopulated PESTS.
I was parallel parking one time in downtown Pittsburgh and I heard a "pop" by the drivers front wheel as I was parking. I had flattened a pigeon. You would think the bird would have had the brains to get out of the way of a slow moving car.