Back in them bad ol\u2019 1990s, when we were being taught to fear anyone who \u201clooked\u00a0like\u201d a \u201cgangster,\u201d I worked at an \u201cinner city\u201d library. We were learning the language of \u201czero-tolerance,\u201dgang injunctions and enhancements, immediate suspensions, and criminalizing something we used to call \u201cditching school\u201d but now were taught to refer to it as \u201ccriminal\u00a0truancy.\u201d<\/p>\n
The library was an example of the city\u2019s separate-but-equal \u201cinner-city\u201d civic\u00a0infrastructure – code for low-income immigrant and minority neighborhoods. The dilapidated\u00a0building sat precariously at end of a cul-de-sac, butted-up to the side of a freeway embankment,\u00a0at the dark end of a freeway underpass. It was so hidden that the police couldn\u2019t find it!\u00a0On Friday nights, the \u201cBig Top\u201d gang discovered that the parking lot was a great party\u00a0spot. It was. Secluded from the street, the freeway screaming just feet away, they could play\u00a0their music loud and not bother anyone. I wish we had a place like that when I was young\u2026<\/p>\n
The partying was one thing. But staff would arrive on Saturday mornings to busted beer
\nbottles everywhere and the side of the building, pathetic as it was, covered in graffiti.<\/p>\n
The library\u2019s administrative impulse here, almost by policy, and certainly reaction, was to\u00a0call the police \u2013 even if they couldn\u2019t find the building.<\/p>\n
Then would come the lights and sirens, helicopters, and kids getting busted (if not
\nworse).<\/p>\n
I honestly don\u2019t know where it came from, but a different idea dawned on me. It just
\nseemed like a reasonable thing to at try.
\nI got this big piece of scrap cardboard, and wrote this [verbatim]\u2026<\/p>\n
Come on, you guys.
\nThe little kids come in on Saturday. Do you want
\nthem to think of Echo Park like this?<\/p>\n
I taped the sign to the front door.
\nThe next morning, staff came back into my office and says, \u201cyou gotta see this.\u201d We
\nwalk out to the front of the building and saw new tagging.
\nBut rather than the usual stuff, this one simply said, in huge letters, \u201cBig Top, sorry.\u201d
\nAnd they never tagged the library again.<\/p>\n
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