THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, May 19, 1996 TAG: 9605170227
SECTION: PORTSMOUTH CURRENTS PAGE: 06 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Editorial
LENGTH: Short : 33 lines
It was a warm spring night, one of the first of the season, a night to relax outdoors with friends. Drawn by the weather and the music, about 2,000 people gathered at Portside, happy to be outside after a long messy winter.
It was a scene the city hoped for when it opened Portside some years ago - and when it advertised the Thursday night entertainment to attract visitors to see for themselves the safe, clean environment of downtown Portsmouth.
Suddenly the script changed. They were no longer welcome.
A police car arrived, drove through the crowd with a bull horn telling people to go home.
A lot of people got mad. Although it was 10 p.m. and the music had ended and the businesses at Portside had been closed down, 1,000 folks were still visiting with each other before heading home.
Police Chief Dennis Mook told City Council on Tuesday that somebody made a mistake by driving law-abiding citizens away from a public place at 10 p.m.
Mook's admission to the council that his department acted improperly was fine. But, meanwhile, how does the city manage to apologize to all the law-abiding citizens who were treated so rudely by agents of the very people who invited them to the party? by CNB