Parks bylaw still needs a review

Peterborough city council’s decision to officially look the other way so an anti-poverty group can continue handing out meals in Confederation Square park might be, as one councillor put it, an elegant solution to the problem.

Elegant in that giving Food Not Bombs an exemption from the city’s parks bylaw allows them to continue the service they have been providing for nearly 20 years.

However, it doesn’t answer some important questions raised by the original decision to apply the bylaw’s restrictions to the group.

One nagging question: Who decided that security officers who patrol city parks should suddenly issue trespass notices declaring Food Not Bombs was violating the bylaw?

The group has been giving out free food from a tent shelter in the park on Monday nights since 2011, when they moved the service out of the city hall lobby.

Were they acting on instructions from city administration? If so, who gave the order and why, and why now?

If not, do contract security guards have the authority to interpret bylaws and apply them as they see fit?

Then there is the concern raised by Coun. Joy Lachica, who wanted a perhaps less elegant but more meaningful outcome — a review of the parks bylaw, which she described as “overreaching.”

She is right. We argued back when the new parks restrictions were introduced in 2019 that they went beyond what was needed to deal with the tent city issue the bylaw was intended to settle.

At that time the city rolled back some of the most draconian rules — it would have been illegal for anyone to spend time in a park after 11 p.m. for any reason, for instance — but the bylaw is still chock full of rules and restrictions that don’t need to be there. Food Not Bombs won its exempt status partly because of protest from several citizens who were upset the city would shut down a successful project that feeds the homeless and disadvantaged, and partly because what they were doing violated the letter of the bylaw but not, we think, its spirit.

The blanket prohibition on setting up a tent, for instance. It is aimed as sleeping tents. The group uses an open-sided shelter that keeps food dry. And they don’t cook or provide food as part of a commercial venture or promotion.

The exemption they got would not apply to a family that goes to Beavermead Park to swim at the beach and sets up a little pole shelter to keep the sun off, and maybe barbecues burgers for lunch.

If the children yelled when they were running around, that would be a violation of the prohibition on “loud language.” If they rode their bikes to the park, another ticket.

“Disturb” any grass (whatever that might mean) and you’ve committed another violation.

According to Food Not Bombs, in addition to exempting their food service from the bylaw, the city has built in a municipal fine of up to $750 that cannot be appealed to a judge.

If that is the case — no report detailing the changes was filed at council so it is hard to know — the lack of an avenue to challenge fines is another concern.

Lachica and Coun. Alex Bierk, who also voted against the exemption in hopes of getting a general bylaw review instead, should press on with that option.

The bylaw is an overreach into the rights of people to use and enjoy public space. Many of the smaller restrictions that seemed reasonable in the heat of the tent city controversy are not necessary and should be removed.

Food Not Bombs won its exempt status partly because of protest from several citizens who were upset the city would shut down a successful project that feeds the homeless and disadvantaged, and partly because what they were doing violated the letter of the bylaw but not, we think, its spirit