What To Do About People’s Park?

What To Do About People’s Park?

Sam Adams was a politician in Berkeley, California. He had grown up in the 60s and 70s and was well known among the local political elite. He served for many years on the Berkeley city council serving as the head of the more moderate faction among the divided city council. Constantly reminding the other members of the city council that they were elected to solve the day-to-day problems of the citizens of the city and not to get involved with things beyond the control of the city or the scope of their duties. Reminding his friends and foes alike that

“We don’t have time for this”.

That made him an enemy of the hard-core left-wing faction who was constantly demanding the city take on all sorts of challenges way beyond that of a typical medium-sized California city. They denounced him as a closet conservative, or as a tool of the local business community, the evil University of California, or the real estate developers who were trying to build desperately needed housing.
It all came to a head one day when the city council was asked to weigh in on the issue of what to do about “People’s Park” that fabled piece of land that had engendered so much strife and demonstrations back in the fabled 60s. To Sam and his friends, “peoples park” was an eyesore, a homeless encampment in the heart of the University district that should be developed into much-needed housing and services. He felt that the University’s offer to develop housing at the park while maintaining a small park in the middle of the site was a reasonable use of the land. He was soon denounced as an “enemy of the people”, which he soon adopted as his campaign slogan.


Write a story that includes the line: “We don’t have time for this.”