Politicians, Merchants, and Law Enforcement Dirty our City by Trying to Keep it “Clean”

Every Mardi Gras and Cinco De Mayo in San Jose you can expect to find police vehicles, helicopters, and beat officers in full force, placed throughout the city, especially downtown. The two holidays are occasions for partying and celebration by San Jose's young folks – and we get plenty of visitors from the East Bay. They are also occasions for the cops to dress up in riot gear, complete with helmets with face shields, four foot batons, bullet proof vests, and large, hand held crowd shields. What is this all about? Doesn't law enforcement know that when they come out like this, the young people perceive it as an attack, a challenge?

At a glance this scenario might look normal. Most citizens will see this as they drive down Santa Clara Street, watch the evening news, or read the next days Mercury News, and think SJPD's finest are simply doing their job. But it is not that simple. Indeed, the truth is not that nice and clean. If it is true that SJPD is doing their job, what does that mean?

Most of the young folks that form the crowds that walk up and down Santa Clara sidewalks, and cruise up and down the strip on Mardi Gras and Cinco De Mayo are the Bay Area's so-called “troublemakers” and “at-risk” youth. Their ages will range anywhere from 13-30, but they are primarily Chicano's, Mexicans, Blacks, Filipinos, and other non-white ethnicities that make up San Jose's mixed bag of peoples and cultures. Although most just come out to party and flirt with people of the opposite sex there is always a bunch that comes out to fight. Cinco de Mayo, in particular, is an excuse to get a rush of violent adrenaline. Younger dudes look forward to fighting each other, while some of the older gangsters know that they might have a violent confrontation with law enforcement. Cops are well aware of this, and it scares them.

This is why SJPD works so hard, and puts so much money and planning into controlling these two holidays. They are two days that become small-scale battles for the momentary power to control some of the most important territory in the city. Santa Clara is now home to City Hall, countless commercial and state buildings, and a bunch of chain businesses. In the mind of city officials and law enforcement, young people that come out to party by making Santa Clara theirs for a night or two cannot walk around with the notion that they are in control. The city's politicians and police – both arms of the state and large national government – thus take a very firm, and often ugly stance in showing San Jose's rebellious population that if they step out of line.

In San Francisco, Oakland, and Los Angeles the police do not fuss over the things that SJPD does. Historically the young, poor, Black and Brown gangsters from these cities have been quick to fight back at the police. While these same rebels often act as predators of innocent citizens – which is another story in itself – they nevertheless pose a legitimate threat to state control. The situation is more volatile in these cities, which is why law enforcement cannot give attention to shutting down party scenes. SJPD fears that our city's poor gangsters will reach such militancy, which is why they shut down anything that might become an occasion for mass rebellion – rioting. An additional factor is that the city's major commercial, political, and cultural buildings have been built around a street that is also the major venue for the city's young social – and anti-social – gatherings.

Along with control is the issue of displacement. San Jose's big government and commercial heads have been working very hard together to sanitize the city's image – to make it look safe for downtown's high citizens. After all, there is a lot of money, information, technology and power circulating through downtown San Jose's veins. So you have the new MLK library that looks much more like an office building. There's “re-development” occurring all over the surrounding blocks. Old Victorian houses have been destroyed so that new, hotel style apartment buildings can temporarily house those that can afford the rent. The downtown blocks between the Children's Discovery Museum, the Arena, the recently closed hospital, and the University campus now look like every other American city's downtown – dominated by dull and overbearing office buildings, corporate-chain businesses, and overly tamed cultural gathering centers. Much of downtown San Jose used to look like an American city of 1950's, with family owned corner markets, mom-and-pop shops, humble cultural establishments, and venues for the city's not so well-to-do residents. Gentrification does not fully describe one of the motives for the city's “re-development” actions. Population displacement and control are closer to what has been happening in our city.      

From the military style of controlling Mardi Gras and Cinco de Mayo, to the displacement of undesired people, edifices, and establishments through a slow and underhanded process called   “re-development”- thus is presented as something good - our city is in the midst of losing much of the culture and energy that has made it “home” for generations of hard-working people, whom are primarily Chicanos, poor whites, Blacks, Mexicans, and Filipinos. To be sure, the culture is being pushed out, and the energy is being violently caged and suppressed all in the name of keeping a “clean” city.

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