This was from last week's Houston Press and some people have offered some very revealing quotes (confirming that they don't go to the party to buy souviners and see concerts and that they police don't intend to arrest all violators).
Beach Party Blues
Galveston grapples with economic woes, racial overtones and new ways out of a spring festival
BY SCOTT NOWELL
Tourism drives the Galveston economy, and so it would seem residents would welcome a yearly event that attracts about 150,000 visitors in April. But now city officials are looking to the east -- East Beach, that is -- to try to corral the raging, unwanted beast that has become Beach Party Weekend.The informal festivities, which begin this year on April 19, draw the ire of a growing number of Galvestonians who say the unruly crowds -- and municipal costs -- add up to an annual disaster.
The event began in the mid-'80s as Kappa Beach Party, a gathering of college students hosted by the historically black fraternity Kappa Alpha Psi. During the '90s, crowds grew enormously, and the beach event morphed into a cruising spectacle replete with rowdiness, loud music and scenes that would fit perfectly into videos hawked on late-night TV with ads that scream: "These girls are WILD!"
Galveston Police Chief Bob Pierce says most of the 150,000 visitors spend their waking hours cruising a ten-mile wedge formed by the two main streets of Broadway and Seawall Boulevard. An estimated 50,000 vehicles create traffic nightmares that disrupt local life to the extent that dozens of businesses close because their employees can't get to work. Some Galvestonians perceive that they are being held hostage in their own city, and forced to pay for it.
Crowds have become decidedly less collegiate -- Kappa Alpha Psi disassociated itself from the event a few years ago -- and increasingly vocal citizens complain that the event has become little more than an exercise in lawlessness and near-total disregard for island sensibilities.
Clouding the issues of traffic, noise, nudity and littering are allegations of racism. Beach Party attendees are mostly black, and many of Galveston's African-Americans say the carousing is not much different from that of the mostly white or racially mixed crowds that descend on the island during Mardi Gras or spring break. Others say that if Beach Party were a similar gathering of white youths, the event would have been banned long ago. The argument has divided the city along somewhat predictable racial lines.
"I think a lot of [the opposition] is racial," says Dwayne Darden. The 34-year-old Houstonian operates kappabeachfest.com, one of a dozen or so Web sites devoted to Beach Party. "I always try to put myself in the other guy's shoes, and I understand how people might fear a large crowd of blacks invading their town. But it's only for two days, and I think that if they came out and maybe participated a little bit, they might enjoy it."
Meyer Reiswerg, better known as the proprietor of Col. Bubbie's Strand Surplus Senter, agrees that some objections to Beach Party are racially motivated. "But I'm Jewish, and if 150,000 Hasidic Jews came down here and behaved the way these people behaved, I'd be just as opposed to it."
Many merchants say the only attention they pay to color is the red ink on their balance sheets.
Reiswerg's store is located in the downtown Strand District. That normally vibrant area is virtually deserted during Beach Party, because access is often blocked by the traffic jams elsewhere.
"Our season lasts from April to August, and they are taking away one of those 16 weekends we have. That's almost 10 percent of our business," says Reiswerg. "We make our money off tourists, and these people do not act like tourists. They bring their own food and liquor."
Darden agrees that Beach Party participants don't lavish their cash on the locals. "We don't go to Galveston to spend money," he says.
What appears to be beyond dispute is that Beach Party Weekend is a financial loss for the city, while Mardi Gras and spring break rain dollars down upon the island. Paula Ozymy, special events coordinator for the city, says Beach Party costs Galveston's taxpayers about $400,000 for port-a-johns, cleanup and approximately 700 additional police officers.
"I don't really buy that $400,000 figure," says City Councilman Joe Jaworski. "We spend that money, but the hotels are full, and sales tax revenues are up. We don't lose a whole lot of money." But Jaworski acknowledges that the event discourages the family-type tourism that Galveston businesses crave. The city has unsuccessfully attempted to recoup expenses in the past through vendor licensing and a $20 "cruising fee," a plan tried and rejected by state officials because it improperly denied access to public beaches.
This year the city will license no outside vendors, and parking will be banned on Seawall Boulevard. Those who want to go to the beach that weekend will have to park at one of three off-site lots in Galveston and take free city shuttle buses.
Ozymy says an effort is being made to shift Beach Party activities "eastward and beachward." The hope is to gradually move the event to East Beach, miles away from residential areas. Concerts will be held there on Saturday and Sunday, and promoters hope to attract thousands with live music, bikini contests, and basketball and domino tournaments. According to Allan Flores, who has concession rights on East Beach, the plan is "to turn the event into more of a festival." The cost for the all-day gathering will be $30 per vehicle.
However, Darden says, there won't be many takers. "I wouldn't go to a concert there even if it was free." Attempts to attract concert crowds in past years have mostly failed. The reason, says Darden, is that people go to see and be seen. "We go there to cruise, not play dominoes. We are not at all cool with the sectioning off of activity to one secluded section of the beach."
Jim and Lynda Guidry are typical of the event's critics. Their Broadway home provides them with an unwanted front-row seat on the action. The Guidrys, who operate a county news service, say they have seen all they want of the backed-up traffic, drug use, wall-shaking rap music, public nudity, prostitution and deliberate efforts by some partygoers to trash the island.
They have ample support from residents for the group they founded, Citizens for Higher Standards, which calls for an end to the lawlessness and indecency. Darden himself admits that things get wild during the festive weekend, but he says the bedlam is no different from that of "white-oriented" events like Mardi Gras and spring break. The Guidrys say the only solution to the problems of those events is a police crackdown.
"We want our codes and laws enforced 24/7/365," says Lynda Guidry. Her husband says the outnumbered officers could start enforcement action on the Friday night of Beach Party, before most of the crowd arrives, "and if there's a riot, then shut down the island."
Councilman Jaworski reflects the city's dilemma: "If a citizen wants to come down to the city in the free United States of America, then we have a responsibility to provide for public safety." He notes that one critic challenged him to "have the guts" to oppose the event. "I said, 'What do you want me to do? Appeal to a higher being to stand at the bridge and stop them from coming across?' "
Police Chief Pierce says there is a small percentage of "gangsters and wannabes who bring in prostitutes to try and make money" but that the primary problem is simply rowdy behavior. Outside police also are less likely to file formal charges on minor infractions, he concedes.
"We can get all the Houston officers we want," says Pierce. "But they're not necessarily going to write a lot of tickets. They aren't going to want to come back for court."
Jim Guidry says an incident last year illustrates the lack of enforcement. He confronted a man who threw trash near his home. A crowd gathered, and the cop who arrived said he'd been told -- falsely -- that Guidry had made racial remarks. He chided Guidry for "creating a disturbance" and told him to leave.
Also last year, Lynda Guidry says, she approached a prostitute who was negotiating a deal near her house and was told, "Why don't you take your white ass back in the house?"
Area jails could be filled up within a few hours, Pierce concedes, but "that wouldn't solve anything." He lauds the department's approach to the event and notes that other cities with similar festivities sent observers to Galveston to learn how to handle such crowds.
"That weekend is a major nuisance," says Pierce, "but for all the trash and inconvenience, it's just one day. The island is okay -- the houses are still here."
The same group puts on a similar event called the "Kappa Lueau" here in Tallahassee, Florida. It was this past weekend here. Its a nice three days of traffic jams, theft at the malls, trashing of places and general nuisance from out-of-town thugs. It was not that bad until they started getting national "rap acts" to come. It was just a fraternity thing, until they gave every thug within 200 miles a reason to come here. After hearing about some of these other events in other towns, my mom asked me, "Do they just pick a different town each weekend to trash?"