Dogs are sweet and loving creatures, devoted to their families and mainly friendly. But they–or the subject of them–can divide a community pretty darned quickly.

Dogs on leash, dogs off leash, people who don’t pick up their dogs’ poop, people who don’t control their dogs, people who control their dogs too stringently. Everyone has a story.

The recent attack of a poodle by two roving, vicious pit bull terriers is sure to get just about every animal lover choosing sides. In one corner, there are the people who think that pit bulls get a bad rap. In another, there are plenty of people who, fearful of the dogs’ strength, blind obedience to their owners and unpredictability, want them banned from the city altogether.

The city is using the attack (see page 1) as an excuse to start citing owners whose dogs are running off leash in Patterson Park. Cops say that this is in response to park users who have called to say they feel threatened by the loose dogs. Dog owners, of course, say that their dogs need to run free in order to exercise, socialize and relax, and they’re not bothering anyone.

Time was that there was a small group of people who ran their dogs in some marshy land southeast of the Pagoda. This was before the park was really popular, and before the housing boom and then the bust. This was a time when there were a whole lot more sketchy characters in the park. And the dogs helped keep them away, and everyone appreciated that. No one bothered them, and joggers knew not to cross the soft land southeast of the Pagoda.

But there are a whole lot more people using the park these days, and a whole lot more dogs. And there are plenty of people—still—who open the door and let their dogs run out of the house. They are the ones who need to get citations.

It would be nice if the citation-writers would make a distinction between “off leash” and “under control.” In the old days, Animal Control officers would announce themselves well before reaching the dogs [Read more...]

Call it a side-effect of the Occupy Movement that brings up the fact that there are more little people than big tycoons. Call it an enlightened consumer consciousness brought about by a weakened economy.

Or just call a spade a spade: people don’t want to work on Thanksgiving.

We’ve been seeing a lot in the news: big-box store employees calling the public’s attention to the fact that they are expected to work on Thanksgiving night in order to have the place ready for the crowds on Black Friday. (How much more ready do they really need to be? Stay late on Wednesday, people. It’s not rocket science).

And of course, there are plenty of signs up in store windows all over the place, stating the premises “will be open for your convenience on Thanksgiving Day.”

Whose convenience is that? Not the employees, who will have to leave their dinner early or even abdicate a national holiday.

Probably not managers and supervisors in such stores. They will have to deal with the problems that crop up. And the customers? There might be a few, but most of them like the idea of a holiday as well. In fact, they might even be more turned off by the idea of a company that doesn’t care whether its employees have a holiday. Maybe even enough to take their business to a store that does care.

Let’s face it: it’s for the convenience of the people who want to make money.

While we do live in a society of 24-hour convenience stores, 24-hour grocery stores, 24-hour home improvement stores, 24-hour big-box stores and more, isn’t it time to re-evaluate how much of that convenience is really….convenient?

Several decades ago, I spent a year studying in England. One of the first things I noticed was the fact that very few shops in my litle college town were open on Sunday. Surprised, I asked the dean why this was.

He laughed. “Because nobody wants to work on Sunday,” he said. “Would you?”

It was a wake-up call for me. If I wanted something for Sunday, I would have to get my shopping done another day. I adapted to the schedule, and came home none the worse for it.

Maybe that’s what is needed by the shoppers here who are misguided enough to think they need a Thanksgiving Day fix: adaptability. The motivation to get something done in advance. If a shopper thinks they’re going to [Read more...]

One of the beauties, to me, of having a cell phone is that I can decide who gets the number, not Ma Bell. I can give the number to friends and associates, and the only junk calls I get are from those automated thingies that dial at random. I am totally off the phone book.

Speaking of which, have you noticed how small the telephone directory is these days? More and more of us are opting out of landlines and the phone book. Privacy is a wonderful thing.

The United States Congress is about to end all that. There is a bill, HR3035, in the House of Representatives that will allow candidates, PACs, parties and others to send political robocalls to your cell phone—and you wouldn’t be able to opt out, because political speech is protected under the First Amendment.

The bill is called the “Mobile Informational Call Act of 2011.” My eye.

The general “information” that gets distributed via political robocall is below preschool standards. Basically, it goes like this.

From Democrats: Candidate A is a reactionary poopypants because he’s a Republican.

From Republicans: Candidate B is a socialist poopypants because he’s a Democrat.

That’s it! That’s political speech protected under the First Amendment.

Do we really need our time, and our mobile minutes, taken up with this nonsense?

At least we can do something about the time–like most people, the moment I sense a robocall on the other end of the line, I hang up. Time saved.

But minutes? Every time some politico decides to call us during a hot race, it costs us minutes.

Perhaps we should call the act “The Mobile Maximizing Telcom Profit Act of 2011.”

The bill is sponsored by Rep. Lee Terry, a six-term Republican from Nebraska. He’s a pretty middle-of-the-road Republican, according to govtrack.us, a nonpartisan reporting website. He’s conservative, but he’s not sitting on the most distant pinfeathers of the right wing.
The bill was referred to Terry’s own committee, the House Energy and [Read more...]

There is a transportation pecking order here in the city.

Cyclists in the city complain that motorists cut them off in traffic and drive with a general disregard for bicyclists’ safety.

Of course, not all motorists are that way, the cyclists are quick to say, while implying that most are.

So the City of Baltimore has marked off bicycle lanes on just about every street in the city to make riding safer for cyclists.

And still the cyclists ride on the sidewalk. Of course I am quick to write that not all cyclists ride on the sidewalk. It just seems like most cyclists do.

Just about all of us who walk any distance in the city have tales of close escapes as cyclists whiz by.

Joe Manfre did not get a close escape–he got a broken leg, and surgery, and is in for a good long stint of rehab.

Just about everyone on the east side of town knows Joe, because he volunteers for everything. He’s active in his community group, he’s a friend of the library, he’s coordinating the Highlandtown Train Garden at Engine 41 this year, along with a host of other things.

At 7:30 a.m. Joe represented the Hampstead Hill Association at the opening of Hampstead Hill Academy’s new pre-K wing. Then he had to run–he had a lot of things to do that day.
On Friday about noon Joe was walking along Eastern Avenue toward the Creative Alliance when a cyclist, going pretty fast on the sidewalk, plowed into him. Joe went flying.
To the cyclist’s credit, he stopped and called 911. But when staffers ran out of the Creative Alliance to help, the cyclist jumped on his bike and sped away.

Still on the sidewalk.

Cyclists complain about motorists not looking out for them. Motorists should look out for the little guy, they say.

The cyclists are right. But they need to look out for their version of the little guy–that is, the pedestrian–too.

Cyclists need to stay the hell off the sidewalk. Period. There are bike lanes all over the city. Use them.

Joe, who is 67, had surgery on Saturday to set his broken femur. He’s in for a good long rehab. Here’s hoping he makes it to the opening of the Highlandtown Train Garden Dec. 3–he’s been working on the project since March. It would be a real pity if he missed the opening.
More on traffic. Can we all agree that motorists and cyclists should obey traffic signals? According to the State of Maryland they should, but apparently most of them missed the memo. In the last week I have nearly been run down at Conkling and Eastern, Broadway and Fleet, and Fort and Lawrence—each time while walking with the signal. A friend often has to dodge traffic–four-wheeled and two-wheeled–at Ann and Aliceanna.

You can make a right turn on red, but you are supposed to stop first. And while you are stopped, you’re supposed to look at the crosswalks around you, not at your iPhone. It’s a law, not a serving suggestion.

by Jacqueline Watts
editor@baltimoreguide.com

It costs about $4 million to put on an election in the city. That pays the judges’ salaries, rent for the polling rooms, the ballot counters, the guys who set up the machines, the guys who drive the machines to the voting rooms, overtime for the cops who patrol the polls and carry the hard drives with the results to the Board of Elections, etc., etc.

Democracy is not cheap.

So, in these challenging times for city budgets, why do we hold a state election for $4 million, and then turn around the next year and hold a city election for another $4 million? Why not combine them?
Glad you asked.

All of us, or at least just about all of us, aspire to something bigger. Triple-A ballplayers dream of the majors. Assistant principals know in their hearts that they’d be better than the guy currently in the big office. Middle managers dream of being CEOs and mismanaging huge corporations.

City Council members dream of the state legislature. State legislators dream of the second floor of City Hall, where the big ceremonial office is.

And if a politician can try for another office without risking his current office, well, then, he likes that a lot.

For instance, State Senator Catherine Pugh took a whack at the mayor’s office in the Democratic primary this year. She lost, but she’s keeping her job in the State Senate.

For that sort of risk-free political aspiration, taxpayers pay $8 million in two years—two primaries, two general elections, one set for state offices, one set for city offices. When, if we just made politicians take a leap of faith–take a little risk–we’d spend only $4 million.

$4 million is a lot of money. If you’re the Enoch Pratt Free Library, it’s more than 10 percent of the operating budget. Over at Recreation and Parks, it’s more than 15 percent of the city’s allocation. I mention these two departments because they are the usual targets when city officials sharpen their budget axes.

Combining the two elections would complicate things somewhat for candidates, because it would make fundraising harder–corporations and individuals are limited to a certain amount per election [Read more...]