Just days after boxes appeared at The Children’s Pool and in Scripps Park to delineate where vendors may operate under tightened free speech regulations, enforcement of such regulations has begun – and so has pushback.
A group of San Diego police officers and Park Rangers worked together April 3 to pack a vendor’s wares into a bag at Scripps Park, enforcing tighter restrictions on a March 2022 ordinance designed to curb sidewalk vending in public spaces.
La Jolla business owner Chas. Dye, who saw the April 3 enforcement, hopes there will be more enforcement of the many other vendors still in the park and that Rangers and police will continue to work to “clear everybody out.”
Vendors operating under free speech may conduct activities such as speaking in public about political, ideological or religious topics; distributing brochures; and art creation and sales.
These activities must be done in one of the spaces provided by the city of San Diego, marked by blue paint or cement pavers.
Not everyone is looking forward to the enforcement, as indicated by messages chalked in and around the Children’s Pool vendor space sometime during the dark, early morning hours of April 4.
Lajolla.ca observed a city employee washing off the messages, which included statements such as “All of U.S. is a free speech zone, not just where they box you in” and “Free speech cannot be contained or constrained to a 8×4 [foot] space!”
