Editorial: Whatever Became of the Commons?
"Public Commons for Everyone.” Has a nice ring to it, doesn’t it? The slogan, adopted by Mayor Bates for his re-run of the anti-panhandling ordinance which he’d supported once before, was probably coined by his house flack Cisco DeVries, formerly of San Francisco’s Staton & Hughes political public relations firm. It acquired Orwellian overtones when it became clear that the Bates ordinance’s real purpose was to keep unattractive persons away from the public commons, particularly from shopping districts. But the council approved it, in concept at least. -more-