Totally illegal discrimination against homeless people is being practiced at the Long Beach Public Library. Security guards have been instructed to use the excuse that no bags can be brought into the library to ban the homeless, who are then faced with the alternatives of leaving their possessions outside (where the chances are very high that they will be stolen) or losing their right to use the public library, which is exactly what the library administration wants them to lose. Employees have been, I am informed, instructed to cooperate by reporting homeless people carrying even small bags to the guards. Meanwhile, workers at the library have been told to fawn on the "business community" and develop an enthusiastic attitude about setting up special tables and computers for business executives to use, even though most of them do not even live inside the city of Long Beach. The guards have been warned not to harrass them even if they bring in giant suitcases on wheels despite the fact that the homeless cannot bring in a bag of any size because it may constitute a "safety hazard."
To add to the sleaziness, the Library is now boasting that it is a friend of the disabled because it has a special room where computers accesssible to wheel-chair bound people, the sight-impaired, and others is supposedly open to everyone. The problem is that it is not; the whole thing is a fraud. Many, perhaps most of the severly disabled people in the immediate vicinity of the library are homeless. They cannot use the special services for the handicapped because they cannot get into the library without leaving all their worldly possessions outside to be stolen. It certainly takes a cold heart and a cynical mind to think up a policy like that and then boast that the library is a friend of the disabled.
Homeless people with bags who refuse to leave the library have the cops called on them, and often end up being brutalized and arrested for disturbing the peace. This situation is an atrocity.
Anyone who wants to protest about this situation can e-mail the library at
eschmidt@lbpl.org. or simply go to the library's web site at www.lbpl.org.