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Post by sharon on Nov 9, 2014 9:30:40 GMT -4
Please let me clarify. I used to spend a lot of time in Terrapin & Matapeak Park walking the trails or just spending time by the water. On numerous times I saw people being dropped off by pickup, with anywhere from 1/2 dozen people to a dozen, ranging in age from toddler to middle aged. They had beer, food & other items. There was 1 time in particular that there was a guy in a tree bow hunting, which is illegal in the park at alltimes, & when he realized he had been seen climbed down & ran. There were also areas just off in the grass along the beach where there were blankets & personal items made into a make shift sleeping area. Surrounding the are were dirty diapers flung in the reeds, bottles, chips bags etc. It was obvious that these people were squatting or spending more than an afternoon at the beach. All I can say is that ALL of these individuals appeared to be of Hispanic descent & they were speaking Spanish. I made the assumption that they were illegals. I guess I could have speculated that they were just homeless.
So....not to be insensitive or not politically correct or run the risk of offending anyone for a bazillion & 1 other reasons. I don't care what color your skin is. I don't care what language you speak or if you don't speak at all. I don't care what your age is, what your religious choice is or isnt. I don't care if you live here or not. I don't even give a spit if you have a green card or are a citizen. What I DO care about is having to pay MORE $$$$$, & it could be as little as $1 more, to use parks in the county I live in, to help cover the cost of having some kind of security here to discourage PEOPLE from remaining in the parks between dark & dawn. (although they don't have guards here 24/7) & to help decrease trash.
Well let me say this. YOU!!! - Whomever you are - pick up you crappy diapers, bottles & other trash. Carry a poop bag with you to clean up after yourself, & maybe even do with 1 less bottle of beer & buy a roll of toilet tissue to use then put it in your bag). If you can't respect my beach & park area then go back from where you came from....be it Grasonville, Chestertown, Annapolis, Bowie, Glen Burnie, Michigan, California, Mexico, Jamaica or anywhere in between or beyond. Did I leave anyone out??? If you can clean up after yourself & others, if you are here with a group, can obey the park rules then by all means welcome. If not then get the He** out & take your CRAP with you. In the mean time I am NOT paying more $$$$ for a permit to visit my parks.
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Post by emsguru on Nov 9, 2014 10:04:20 GMT -4
Please let me clarify. I used to spend a lot of time in Terrapin & Matapeak Park walking the trails or just spending time by the water. On numerous times I saw people being dropped off by pickup, with anywhere from 1/2 dozen people to a dozen, ranging in age from toddler to middle aged. They had beer, food & other items. There was 1 time in particular that there was a guy in a tree bow hunting, which is illegal in the park at alltimes, & when he realized he had been seen climbed down & ran. There were also areas just off in the grass along the beach where there were blankets & personal items made into a make shift sleeping area. Surrounding the are were dirty diapers flung in the reeds, bottles, chips bags etc. It was obvious that these people were squatting or spending more than an afternoon at the beach. All I can say is that ALL of these individuals appeared to be of Hispanic descent & they were speaking Spanish. I made the assumption that they were illegals. I guess I could have speculated that they were just homeless. So....not to be insensitive or not politically correct or run the risk of offending anyone for a bazillion & 1 other reasons. I don't care what color your skin is. I don't care what language you speak or if you don't speak at all. I don't care what your age is, what your religious choice is or isnt. I don't care if you live here or not. I don't even give a spit if you have a green card or are a citizen. What I DO care about is having to pay MORE $$$$$, & it could be as little as $1 more, to use parks in the county I live in, to help cover the cost of having some kind of security here to discourage PEOPLE from remaining in the parks between dark & dawn. (although they don't have guards here 24/7) & to help decrease trash. Well let me say this. YOU!!! - Whomever you are - pick up you crappy diapers, bottles & other trash. Carry a poop bag with you to clean up after yourself, & maybe even do with 1 less bottle of beer & buy a roll of toilet tissue to use then put it in your bag). If you can't respect my beach & park area then go back from where you came from....be it Grasonville, Chestertown, Annapolis, Bowie, Glen Burnie, Michigan, California, Mexico, Jamaica or anywhere in between or beyond. Did I leave anyone out??? If you can clean up after yourself & others, if you are here with a group, can obey the park rules then by all means welcome. If not then get the He** out & take your CRAP with you. In the mean time I am NOT paying more $$$$ for a permit to visit my parks. I take major offense to this. Why did you only call out people from grasonville when listing towns in our county? There are trashy people in stevensville and chester too!! Lol
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Post by sharon on Nov 9, 2014 10:17:31 GMT -4
I hate paying taxes and fees are a form of tax but it is shocking to me how upset people get about a $35 fee. If you don't charge the user the rest of the citizens will pay for it one way or another if you want clean and safe beaches. I pay to use the boat ramp and I do not expect other citizens in QAC to pay for the boat ramps if they don't have a boat. I think Jim Moran and Mark Anderson have a good compromise in the works and I hope Paul Comfort hears them out after they have had a chance to make sure it is 100% legal before he attempts to reverse it. Why should out of county residents get a free ride off the backs of the QAC taxpayer. I am not terribly knowledgeable as to the specifics of the majority of our taxes etc like some folks here are, so at the risk of getting slammed let me say this....I am only going to speak for me here.....my understanding is that part of my taxes go towards the care of our parks. (I don't know the exact wording ok?) 1 of the perks when I moved to the island was that there were a couple of nice parks, with beaches, with in a 5 min drive. I proceeded to spend a lot of time at them. There was some trash on the beaches. Some from people not taking their trash with them, some from transients that didn't clean up after themselves & some from the water that is littered by many, everywhere. I always picked up some of the trash & put it in my trash bag to carry out with me. It was my bit to help the county in addition to the taxes I was paying for the upkeep. There are volunteer groups that come in from out of county to do cleanup. Over the yrs the litter has increased along with the number of hours in a day that some people remain within the park. Some that stay there for days at a time. Now if I want to use the park Im required to pay an additional fee, call it a fee or a tax I don't care, it is in addition to what I already pay. I won't pay it & it is strictly the principal of the $$ not the amount. If part of my taxes are suppose to go toward the park care why should I now have to pay more to use the park with that $$ supposedly to care for the park? If the $$ is for additional security, thats fine too, but then why isnt there a full time security guard or rather an officer to ticket violators there?
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Post by ravens20 on Nov 10, 2014 1:12:44 GMT -4
I hate paying taxes and fees are a form of tax but it is shocking to me how upset people get about a $35 fee. If you don't charge the user the rest of the citizens will pay for it one way or another if you want clean and safe beaches. I pay to use the boat ramp and I do not expect other citizens in QAC to pay for the boat ramps if they don't have a boat. I think Jim Moran and Mark Anderson have a good compromise in the works and I hope Paul Comfort hears them out after they have had a chance to make sure it is 100% legal before he attempts to reverse it. Why should out of county residents get a free ride off the backs of the QAC taxpayer. I am not terribly knowledgeable as to the specifics of the majority of our taxes etc like some folks here are, so at the risk of getting slammed let me say this....I am only going to speak for me here.....my understanding is that part of my taxes go towards the care of our parks. (I don't know the exact wording ok?) 1 of the perks when I moved to the island was that there were a couple of nice parks, with beaches, with in a 5 min drive. I proceeded to spend a lot of time at them. There was some trash on the beaches. Some from people not taking their trash with them, some from transients that didn't clean up after themselves & some from the water that is littered by many, everywhere. I always picked up some of the trash & put it in my trash bag to carry out with me. It was my bit to help the county in addition to the taxes I was paying for the upkeep. There are volunteer groups that come in from out of county to do cleanup. Over the yrs the litter has increased along with the number of hours in a day that some people remain within the park. Some that stay there for days at a time. Now if I want to use the park Im required to pay an additional fee, call it a fee or a tax I don't care, it is in addition to what I already pay. I won't pay it & it is strictly the principal of the $$ not the amount. If part of my taxes are suppose to go toward the park care why should I now have to pay more to use the park with that $$ supposedly to care for the park? If the $$ is for additional security, thats fine too, but then why isnt there a full time security guard or rather an officer to ticket violators there? Because the amount of money allocated to the parks is not enough, so if you want more services that money has to come from somewhere. Yes, it really sucks that there's so many people that have no regard for the environment and the cleanliness of our parks. You'd think that because they use them so often that they might consider cleaning up after themselves, but they don't. You can't both demand for more services and refuse to pay for those services. I'd gladly pay double or triple the current fee if it meant getting rid of the trash from our parks. The majority of the offenders are Hispanic, and there's nothing wrong (or racist, Hispanic is not a race by the way, frank) about mentioning that fact, as long as you aren't insinuating that it's specific to Hispanics. There are plenty of black people and white people that are just as inconsiderate, they just don't happen to frequent our parks as much. Is it too much to ask that people clean up after themselves? Keep in mind that there is no charge to enter the parks, you only need to pay if you're parking. I'm within walking and/or biking distance from almost every park on KI and I have no problem paying for the parking pass, even if I only use it a few times a year. Personally I think the best thing to do would be to ban fishing at Terrapin and use the parking fee to pay OT for a deputy to patrol the park and ticket people that are fishing, drinking, etc...
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Post by sharon on Nov 13, 2014 16:19:03 GMT -4
Hey Ravens20, please dont get me wrong...I wouldn't mind paying extra if it were for greater coverage at the parks. Right now what I would get for my $$ is a drive by or around the park. Who is going to spend the full open hours there to monitor how the park is being trashed? Who is going to ticket those individuals for squatting there & leaving trash? I go to Downs Park, Quiet Waters Park, Kinder Park & there is no problem with indigents living inside the park perimeters. Yes there is a bit of trash thrown on the ground by visitors. There will always be that problem to some degree but I've never seen it anywhere near as bad as a Terrapin Park. I do know that if you walk in there is no charge however unless you live close enough to do that it makes it more difficult to just walk over. I have several friends that loved coming over here to bike the CIT but now would have to pay if they park in the park. Fortunately there are places to park free & still have access to bike, walk, skate the trail. Matapeake is a little more problematic. You cant just park in the over flow to bike. Although you could go down to Romancoke pier & park & bike it from there. Here again a friend of mine would go to the Club House at Matapeake Park to take her dog down to the animal beach. Now she would have to pay to park. It's just a frustrating situation. I don't think anything less than full time personnel at Terrapin with additional police visits, which would need to include a trip to the beach area where our visiting residents pitch camp, will ever be productive or solved. Perhaps your idea of banning fishing & using the $$ for police patrolling is an option but I'm not sure there will ever be a beat cop there. Again it would mean leaving the vehicle & foot patrolling the beach area. Probably not a lot of interest in that. Looks like 1 of those no win situations.
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Post by frankf on Dec 9, 2014 17:28:31 GMT -4
GOOD NEWS!
The beach tax was REPEALED at this morning's commissioner's meeting by a vote of 4-1.
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Post by burnerbill on Dec 11, 2014 15:40:13 GMT -4
GOOD NEWS! The beach tax was REPEALED at this morning's commissioner's meeting by a vote of 4-1. Yep, heard that. Now comes the wrangling to find the money for upkeep of the parks to satisfy the many comments here. As Ravens20 commented, the "fee" was enacted because there was not enough money in the budget to provide those services, like we see at Sandy Point, to keep the beach and parking areas clean for all users. Maybe this will come from the surplus the county has been enjoying these last couple years. But, if the new commissioners have it their way, they want to reduce that surplus to zero which is tough to predict since budgets are not set to purposely create a surplus. If they did maintain a surplus at all, we'd be all over them, right? Like they were all over the previous group of commissioners calling them a "tax and spend" group. I guess, by reducing taxes etc, plus adding their "pet projects" to the mix, (Steve Wilson has said he has 30 - 40 things he would like to do in the county) I am certain we won't see a dime other than lower taxes. The end game for this matter has yet to be seen, right?
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Post by frankf on Dec 11, 2014 18:02:34 GMT -4
Perhaps the monies collected FOR parks can be used IN parks.
By the County's own accounting nearly nothing was spent in Terrapin Park (and it shows).
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Post by burnerbill on Dec 11, 2014 18:27:55 GMT -4
Perhaps the monies collected FOR parks can be used IN parks. By the County's own accounting nearly nothing was spent in Terrapin Park (and it shows). That's just it, "what" are they collecting for the parks? If no money is being spent in Terrapin Park, this means the budget has no money to spend there. As I said, it will be interesting what other general needs in the county will be adjusted to support this matter.
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Post by frankf on Dec 11, 2014 19:46:52 GMT -4
Perhaps the monies collected FOR parks can be used IN parks. By the County's own accounting nearly nothing was spent in Terrapin Park (and it shows). That's just it, "what" are they collecting for the parks? If no money is being spent in Terrapin Park, this means the budget has no money to spend there. As I said, it will be interesting what other general needs in the county will be adjusted to support this matter. According to the budget pages I posted here earlier, $2.5 million is earmarked for parks. As I recall, $1900 was spent at Terrapin. That would BARELY cover the cost of running bush hog through there two or three times a season. When I requested specifics on money spent in the maintenance in the park I was given nothing of any substance. I work in a facilities capacity for another county, and I can gather figures on the exact number of dollars spent at any of our facilities for any period of time. As I have mentioned before, 10 years or so ago Terrapin was nice. It was kept up, placards and such here an there with info on plants and animals found in the park, the Fred Flintstone benches were in place and accessible. But over the years it's been allowed to totally fall apart. With a little creativity (KIHS project to create info for placards) or place small signs in front of native species as part of a biology course or something, or enlist the Boy Scouts or some other group to engage, it could be a learning environment as well as a place for people to run. It's county land, and like all other county land should be policed by county staff, parks and rec people or sheriff.
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Post by ravens20 on Dec 11, 2014 22:54:39 GMT -4
That's just it, "what" are they collecting for the parks? If no money is being spent in Terrapin Park, this means the budget has no money to spend there. As I said, it will be interesting what other general needs in the county will be adjusted to support this matter. According to the budget pages I posted here earlier, $2.5 million is earmarked for parks. As I recall, $1900 was spent at Terrapin. That would BARELY cover the cost of running bush hog through there two or three times a season. When I requested specifics on money spent in the maintenance in the park I was given nothing of any substance. I work in a facilities capacity for another county, and I can gather figures on the exact number of dollars spent at any of our facilities for any period of time. As I have mentioned before, 10 years or so ago Terrapin was nice. It was kept up, placards and such here an there with info on plants and animals found in the park, the Fred Flintstone benches were in place and accessible. But over the years it's been allowed to totally fall apart. With a little creativity (KIHS project to create info for placards) or place small signs in front of native species as part of a biology course or something, or enlist the Boy Scouts or some other group to engage, it could be a learning environment as well as a place for people to run. It's county land, and like all other county land should be policed by county staff, parks and rec people or sheriff. By your own admission there was just as much trash 10 years ago as there is now. I think the majority of people have a problem with the trash, which is why there is a group of volunteers dedicated to cleaning up the trash, not replacing the placards. I wonder where they will find the money to clean up the trash since they have never had the money to keep the parks clean. Placards and benches are great, but I'd rather they (the county)focus on cleaning up the parks first.
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Post by frankf on Dec 12, 2014 10:03:11 GMT -4
By your own admission there was just as much trash 10 years ago as there is now. I think the majority of people have a problem with the trash, which is why there is a group of volunteers dedicated to cleaning up the trash, not replacing the placards. I wonder where they will find the money to clean up the trash since they have never had the money to keep the parks clean. Placards and benches are great, but I'd rather they (the county)focus on cleaning up the parks first. Parks line items: FY12 - $1,659,006 FY13 - $2,345,704 FY14 - $2,572,356 $2.5 MILLION is the budget line items for the parks. If the County can't find money to keep the parks cleaned and policed with $2.5 MILLION taxpayer dollars allocated to the parks, parks management needs to be replaced.
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Post by emsguru on Dec 12, 2014 11:10:40 GMT -4
By your own admission there was just as much trash 10 years ago as there is now. I think the majority of people have a problem with the trash, which is why there is a group of volunteers dedicated to cleaning up the trash, not replacing the placards. I wonder where they will find the money to clean up the trash since they have never had the money to keep the parks clean. Placards and benches are great, but I'd rather they (the county)focus on cleaning up the parks first. Parks line items: FY12 - $1,659,006 FY13 - $2,345,704 FY14 - $2,572,356 $2.5 MILLION is the budget line items for the parks. If the County can't find money to keep the parks cleaned and policed with $2.5 MILLION taxpayer dollars allocated to the parks, parks management needs to be replaced. How much of this money comes from the state or feds? And I think your argument has a little bit of merit. However as a tax paying citizen of QAC I'm not such a fan of MY tax dollars going to pay for the 80% of the folks from other counties to use(trash) our parks. There aren't too many beaches across the bridge that I can visit for free, but I guess my taxes should go to give them a free place to trash and camp for the day. Fault the parks and rec department for not asking for a little bit of a money to actively enforce the beaches at the start. Waiting months to start enforcing the parks just allowed them to pay to trash our beaches. Now they can go back to trashing them for free! I would have liked to have seen new management of the plan and one more year to see if it works.
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Post by frankf on Dec 12, 2014 15:29:46 GMT -4
Fault the parks and rec department for not asking for a little bit of a money to actively enforce the beaches at the start. Waiting months to start enforcing the parks just allowed them to pay to trash our beaches. Now they can go back to trashing them for free! I would have liked to have seen new management of the plan and one more year to see if it works. The ONLY thing that money was going to was to collect the fees. It certainly wasn't going to clean up the park or patrol it.
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Post by loudness on Dec 12, 2014 17:37:44 GMT -4
It wasn't such a bad idea, but it was done completely wrong. A QA County Residents sticker should have been free, and out of area people made to pony up. It also should have been a fee to use the beach and not to park in the lots. I saw non residents just parking along the business park roads and walk into Terrapin carrying fishing poles and lots of crap. A fee to use the beach could have funded a gate guard for the season. Now you can consider Terrapin Park/Beach just gone.
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Post by frankf on Dec 12, 2014 20:44:18 GMT -4
It wasn't such a bad idea, but it was done completely wrong. A QA County Residents sticker should have been free, and out of area people made to pony up. It also should have been a fee to use the beach and not to park in the lots. I saw non residents just parking along the business park roads and walk into Terrapin carrying fishing poles and lots of crap. A fee to use the beach could have funded a gate guard for the season. Now you can consider Terrapin Park/Beach just gone. Perhaps a better way might be to hold the County's feet to the fire and SPEND some of that $2.5 MILLION allotted to parks at Terrapin.
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Post by ravens20 on Dec 17, 2014 16:02:28 GMT -4
Fault the parks and rec department for not asking for a little bit of a money to actively enforce the beaches at the start. Waiting months to start enforcing the parks just allowed them to pay to trash our beaches. Now they can go back to trashing them for free! I would have liked to have seen new management of the plan and one more year to see if it works. The ONLY thing that money was going to was to collect the fees. It certainly wasn't going to clean up the park or patrol it. Umm.... that is not true at all. They hired 4 Rangers and had them in training. Stuff takes time, I'm not sure why people thought everything would be fixed immediately. They had to collect the money to hire and pay park rangers first.
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Post by ravens20 on Dec 17, 2014 16:11:48 GMT -4
By your own admission there was just as much trash 10 years ago as there is now. I think the majority of people have a problem with the trash, which is why there is a group of volunteers dedicated to cleaning up the trash, not replacing the placards. I wonder where they will find the money to clean up the trash since they have never had the money to keep the parks clean. Placards and benches are great, but I'd rather they (the county)focus on cleaning up the parks first. Parks line items: FY12 - $1,659,006 FY13 - $2,345,704 FY14 - $2,572,356 $2.5 MILLION is the budget line items for the parks. If the County can't find money to keep the parks cleaned and policed with $2.5 MILLION taxpayer dollars allocated to the parks, parks management needs to be replaced. Those numbers are worthless, they aren't line items for what is spent on the parks. What is that money being spent on? What do you think they are doing with the money? You're going to have to take money from something else if you want to divert it to Terrapin. You need more detailed numbers. We've already established that the only thing that you really care about are a few placards and a couple of benches. The trash doesn't bother you, remember, it was "nice" 10 years ago when there was just as much trash in the parks. Replacing the placards and fixing the benches is a weekend project for a few people that know what they're doing. You painted yourself into a corner with your accusations of racism. Now you have to keep up this ridiculous charade that the parks were just as dirty 10 years ago and that the trash didn't bother you then and doesn't bother you now. If they have NEVER had the money to keep the parks clean, what makes you think they have it now?
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Post by frankf on Dec 17, 2014 17:27:39 GMT -4
Parks line items: FY12 - $1,659,006 FY13 - $2,345,704 FY14 - $2,572,356 $2.5 MILLION is the budget line items for the parks. If the County can't find money to keep the parks cleaned and policed with $2.5 MILLION taxpayer dollars allocated to the parks, parks management needs to be replaced. Those numbers are worthless, they aren't line items for what is spent on the parks. What is that money being spent on? What do you think they are doing with the money? You're going to have to take money from something else if you want to divert it to Terrapin. You need more detailed numbers. We've already established that the only thing that you really care about are a few placards and a couple of benches. The trash doesn't bother you, remember, it was "nice" 10 years ago when there was just as much trash in the parks. Replacing the placards and fixing the benches is a weekend project for a few people that know what they're doing. You painted yourself into a corner with your accusations of racism. Now you have to keep up this ridiculous charade that the parks were just as dirty 10 years ago and that the trash didn't bother you then and doesn't bother you now. If they have NEVER had the money to keep the parks clean, what makes you think they have it now? Yak yak yak... I bet your best friends are hispanics too... If you look at the numbers put out BY THE COUNTY it details EXACTLY how much was spent in each park. The numbers DON'T add up. You're making yourself look foolish. You should stop. Really.
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Post by ravens20 on Dec 23, 2014 0:28:57 GMT -4
Those numbers are worthless, they aren't line items for what is spent on the parks. What is that money being spent on? What do you think they are doing with the money? You're going to have to take money from something else if you want to divert it to Terrapin. You need more detailed numbers. We've already established that the only thing that you really care about are a few placards and a couple of benches. The trash doesn't bother you, remember, it was "nice" 10 years ago when there was just as much trash in the parks. Replacing the placards and fixing the benches is a weekend project for a few people that know what they're doing. You painted yourself into a corner with your accusations of racism. Now you have to keep up this ridiculous charade that the parks were just as dirty 10 years ago and that the trash didn't bother you then and doesn't bother you now. If they have NEVER had the money to keep the parks clean, what makes you think they have it now? Yak yak yak... I bet your best friends are hispanics too... If you look at the numbers put out BY THE COUNTY it details EXACTLY how much was spent in each park. The numbers DON'T add up. You're making yourself look foolish. You should stop. Really. You have numbers on what was spent in each park and how it was spent? I'd love to see it if you have a link. Can you address any of the points that I've made or are you just going to label me a racist with nothing to back it up? Where are you going to take the money from to pay for the cleanup of Terrapin? By your own admission the money was NEVER there to pay for it, so why do you think this money will all of the sudden appear without raising taxes or charging the people that use the parks? You know, this could be a decent discussion if you would let go of the whole racism thing. If you think someone makes a racist statement then call them out, but don't call someone a racist simply because they want a clean beach.
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