City officials want action over bridge protests
Trump demonstrators routinely gather on highway overpass
LAFAYETTE >> At least four times the City Council has tried to figure out what to do about the political gatherings on an overpass above Highway 24, where supporters of former President Donald
Trump have held up signs and flags, while nearby residents complain the groups are noisy and threaten the safety of motorists.
The council has had enough, though it is limited in what it can do.
Now it wants the state — which owns the El Curtola bridge — to step in and enforce any rules to help guarantee the safety of motorists who drive underneath during the demonstrations and who might be distracted by the protesters.
“I don’t care what the protesters are protesting,” Mayor Susan Candell told the council Feb. 22. “The fact is that they have been there, and that the neighbors feel impacted, is a huge concern to me.”
She added: “What they are doing up there, repeatedly, is illegal. And they refuse to stop that behavior.”
What has made resolving the issue difficult is jurisdiction: The state owns the span, but the California High Patrol is responsible for the safety of motorists passing underneath.
But both agencies have adopted a hands-off approach to the gatherings.
Caltrans has instructed its employees not to interact with the demonstrators for safety reasons and only for necessary cleanup or work when they are not present. The CHP is just focused on the highway below and traffic flow, according to the city.
Meanwhile, Lafayette police park near the demonstrators in case things might escalate. The Police Department did not respond to repeated questions about why its officers were not citing the demonstrators for illegally hanging signs or blocking sidewalks.
The council asked city officials to bring back a report on the feasibility of painting curbs red near the overpass to prevent demonstrators from parking nearby. That also would increase visibility for walkers in the hopes it will
make people safer when the demonstrations are taking place.
The council also called for a resolution urging state officials to be more aggressive over any illegal actions on the overpass, such as attaching flags or signs to its fence.
“It’s not the message we are concerned with,” Councilman Carl Anduri said about the protesters, adding, “My concern is safety.”
The council took no formal action but instead asked city staffers to return with recommendations on their requests.
The bridge is a regular spot for political demonstrations, which in the past have included some in support of Black Lives Matter and in honor of 9/11 victims. But the site has been dominated by Trump supporters since before the November election.
Some nearby residents say the current demonstrators, who are questioning the results of the presidential election, are intimidating.
“I have felt threatened
and have never felt safe,” Amy Norstad told the council. “I do not think it’s a good location for a protest.”
Lisa Disbrow, a demonstration organizer, said she was willing to work with residents to resolve issues.
“We care for the people,” Disbrow told the council. “We believe in safety.”
There are no immediate plans to end gatherings on the bridge, Disbrow said during an interview Wednesday, saying the organizers
will evaluate any issues and judge the public interest going forward.
“We continue to believe the election was stolen,” Disbrow said. “We are saying that something was amiss.”
She added that the demonstrations
were the result of people supporting freedom of speech. “Without freedom of speech, we have nothing,” Disbrow said.
Starting in November, because of the increased calls for service, Lafayette police regularly post one to two officers in the area of the overpass during the protests. The events happen about twice each week.
Police Chief Ben Alldritt said 13 collisions occurred on Highway 24 near the bridge from Oct. 1 to Feb. 2. The same number happened from May 1 to Sept. 30 last year.
About half of the accidents happened during the time when protests might have been occurring. The council asked him to come back with more details.
There are varying attitudes in the neighborhood about the protests, Alldritt maintained.
“I think it’s a subjective thing,” he told the council, adding, “Each neighbor feels differently about this.”
The council will again consider the issue at its meeting Monday, which starts at 7 p.m. The meeting can be viewed at www. youtube.com/channel/UCBPuox8U4xResMPv4T_bSJw.
Drivers who park illegally at bus stops or in transitonly lanes could get ticketed more often if a proposal in the Legislature becomes law.
The bill from Assembly member Richard Bloom, D-Los Angeles, allows bus agencies to install automated cameras on the front of their coaches, which could capture the license plate of any car parked in bus stops or dedicated bus lanes.
The vehicle’s owner would get a ticket in the mail and, Bloom and the bill’s supporters hope, learn their lesson not to block the bus.
Those cameras are already in use on some Bay Area buses. AC Transit has issued 588 citations for $110 a pop to drivers who stopped in the bus-only lanes of the Tempo line, which began service from downtown Oakland to San Leandro along International Boulevard last summer, said agency spokesman Robert Lyles.
San Francisco’s Muni buses also have cameras, but state law allows only those two agencies to use the technology and limits their use to enforcement of the busonly lanes.
Bloom’s legislation, which is sponsored by the L.A. Metro transit system, would let any bus agency install cameras and expand where they can be used to include curbside stops. The bill, AB 917, was introduced last month and is now before the Assembly’s transportation committee.
Some drivers think there is little harm pulling into bus stops or lanes when they can’t find a legal space, but Bloom and others say those scofflaws slow down transit service for everyone else and make boarding more dangerous for riders. Blocking dedicated lanes forces drivers to pull out into the rest of traffic to get around the parked car, which can be a risky maneuver.
“Camera enforcement is cost-effective and ideal for busy streets where parking enforcement is not realistic,” Bloom said. “AB 917 will deter drivers from violating bus-only lane designations, ensure the reliability of public transit and help transit remain competitive in our efforts to reduce congestion.”
Along AC Transit’s Tempo line, if a bus operator sees someone blocking the lane he can activate cameras mounted just inside the coach’s windshield with the press of a button to snap a photo of the offender, rather than having to radio a control center and ask for law enforcement to come ticket the car. But the specialized Tempo buses are the only ones in the AC Transit fleet that have the technology.
Darrell Owens, a member of the East Bay Transit Riders Union, said he sees cars blocking busy bus stops “every day” while riding AC Transit in Berkeley. The violators, many of them dropping off or picking up passengers for ridehailing companies such as Uber and Lyft, slow down the bus boarding process and make it more difficult for riders who use wheelchairs, he said.
Stressing that he was speaking on his own behalf and not for the union, Owens said he supports Bloom’s proposal because it would seek to address that problem without a traditional law enforcement response. Owens has been among those pushing for Berkeley to shift responsibility for enforcing traffic laws from police to unarmed civilian workers in an effort to reduce interactions between law enforcement and the public.
“We want to minimize that as much as possible, and one of the ways to do that is to have cameras on the front of the bus,” Owens said. “No cop necessary.”
“Camera enforcement is costeffective and ideal for busy streets where parking enforcement is not realistic.” — Richard Bloom, Assembly member, D-Los Angeles
OAKLAND >> A federal judge sentenced a Discovery Bay resident to federal prison just minutes after the defendant pleaded guilty to child porn charges.
At a Tuesday court hearing, U.S. District Judge Jeffrey White sentenced 62-year-old Jerry Dale Havlovic, a former U.S. Coast Guard employee, to two years and six months in federal prison. White said the sentence was a compromise between the “blameless life” Havlovic led before his arrest, considerations over the COVID-19 pandemic and the need to deter people who look at child pornography.
“I think the message needs to go out that if you get caught with this, the sentence needs to be significant,” White said.
In a written statement to the court, Havlovic apologized for hurting and embarrassing family, friends and co-workers.
“I’ve seen illegal pornography on the internet. sick to my stomach. I’m not sure how to express myself. I feel very badly about it. I wish more could be done to help get the kids out of the situation they’re in,” says Havlovic’s letter, which was included in a defense sentencing memo.
Prosecutors say Havlovic possessed at least 2,500 images of child porn, including “depictions of sexual abuse of young children.”
“The defendant found value in horrific images of children he found on the internet, to include images of children as young as 4 years old being sexually violated,” assistant U.S. Attorney Jonathan Lee wrote in court filings.
Authorities seized two cellphones and a computer during the investigation into Havlovic.
Havlovic’s attorney, Robert Beles, described Havlovic as a decorated former Coast Guard member and son of two L.A. sheriff’s deputies. He said there was evidence to back Havlovic’s story that he originally came across child porn accidentally.