Month: June 2020

Bethlehem’s plan for outdoor dining

logo Latest in a series of posts on the coronavirus logo

City Of Bethlehem’s Outdoor Plan For The Business Community
Saturday, May 30, 2020

After the brutal events of this past weekend, if it weren’t for the masks on protestors, it would be easy to forget that there is a pandemic going on.

The most important communique out of City Hall this weekend was the Mayor’s powerful statement about community after the shocking image of George Floyd’s treatment and the consequent uproar in the streets of so many cities in America.

But back to the pandemic — we are opening up.

Many will be heartened by Bethlehem’s  “Plan for Outdoor Dining and Other Business Uses” for restaurants and retailers who wish to expand their operational footprint to help meet social distancing requirements and to provide additional accommodations to the business districts.

The plan proposes three models for consideration by the business community:

1) street closure: the City will allow closures of downtown sections of Walnut, Adams, New, and 1st street Thursday through Sunday, 4-7pm. Businesses not located in the downtowns can also make requests.

2) parklets: the City will install parklets on Main, Broad, 4th, Vine, and additional parklets can be requested by the Downtown Business Associations and by individual businesses.

3) the City will review requests for use of public spaces, on sidewalks, and on surface parking lots.

Application information and a list of regulations are part of the plan. Educational material on social distancing will be provided.

Howz your appetite?

Protest participant: “To be a part of the future, you need to be a part of the solution”

logo Latest in a series of posts on the George Floyd killing logo

“We are one”
See the Mayor’s powerful statement about community.

protest 10

photo by Tom Shortell, Morning Call

from Tom Shortell, “Voices from the weekend’s protests: Hundreds in Lehigh Valley speak up against police brutality.” Morning Call, May 31, 2020.

Two enormous crowds marched through Allentown and Bethlehem Saturday afternoon, joining a growing list of cities where citizens demonstrated their outrage against police brutality and the death of Minneapolis man George Floyd.

The Lehigh Valley’s protests drew a diverse group — locals and people from out of state, ranging in age from toddlers to senior citizens. Racial identities were widespread as well; a majority of protesters in Bethlehem appeared to be white while Allentown’s was predominantly people of color.

The roof of the champagne-colored BMW buckled but held as Jerome Wilson danced on it in front of Bethlehem’s Payrow Plaza. He and his friends had driven the car from Newark and leaned on the horn as they escorted a river of protesters between Rose Garden Park and City Hall. Wilson previously lived in Bethlehem for a year, but he hadn’t seen it like this.

“Everybody’s here,” he said between jubilant fist bumps with protesters. “White people. Black people. Hispanics. Chinese. Muslims.”

Wilson said people are protesting after growing tired of a corrupt system. Too many black people are set up to fail in the justice system, he said, noting he first found himself in front of a judge in seventh grade. He’s lost count of how many friends are in prison. But while he fed off the energy of the crowd’s chanting vulgarities about police, it did nothing to settle his raw emotions.

“For every one of ours they’ve taken, I want to take two of theirs,” he said.

Moments later, a protester fell to the ground after being hit by a slow-moving vehicle trying to pass through the throngs. Wilson and some friends charged toward the driver, but others jumped in between. It was an honest accident; The driver stopped and apologized, witnesses said. Wilson bounded away, back into the crowd.

Joanne Garcia walked along the fringes of the crowd at Rose Garden Park. As protesters chanted “No justice, no peace,” her 2-year-old son casually eyed the swarm of humanity from his stroller.

As a Latina, Garcia said, interactions with police are a concern routinely weighing on the back of her mind even though she’s never had any problems. But although she’s watched news cycles of minorities dying in police custody for years, she had not joined any protests before. She couldn’t explain why Floyd’s death compelled her when others had not but suspected it could be the little boy content to munch on graham crackers.

In a video of his final moments widely circulated online, the 46-year-old Floyd called out for his mother. She had died two years earlier.

“To be a part of the future, you need to be a part of the solution,” Garcia said as she pushed her baby buggy across Broad Street.

Chief DiLuzio: “That’s the way protests should be”

logo Latest in a series of posts on the George Floyd killing logo

“We are one”
See the Mayor’s powerful statement about community.

Protest 9

photo Amy Shortell, Morning Call
click on this photo in the article linked below for several dozen Bethlehem photos

from Jennifer Sheehan,”‘People felt like they were heard’: Why Lehigh Valley’s demonstrations remained peaceful.” Morning Call, May 31, 2020.

Despite more than 700 people taking to the streets of Allentown and Bethlehem on Saturday to protest the death of George Floyd, no one was arrested and no significant property damage was reported, police said.

Protests in the Lehigh Valley were different because they stayed focused on the death of George Floyd, Bethlehem police Chief Mark DiLuzio said. Floyd, who was black, died after being pinned for more than eight minutes with a white officer’s knee on his neck in Minnesota.

“The difference was I think the people here were trying to get to the issue at hand,” DiLuzio said. “In smaller cities, you have people who are truly interested in the death of George Floyd. In the bigger cities, you have that interest but you also have other people who come into the situation and look for free stuff through looting.”

DiLuzio estimated about 500 protesters marched through Bethlehem on Saturday afternoon although protesters had higher estimates.

“They got their message out there and that’s their constitutional right,” DiLuzio said. “We wanted to make sure they were able to do that.”

DiLuzio was on hand during the protest and said it was very orderly.

“That’s the way protests should be,” he said.

One of the local groups that organized Saturday’s rally in Bethlehem was Lehigh Valley Stands Up, a nonprofit pushing for progressive change. Ashleigh Strange, who heads the group, said Sunday that they worked hard to makes sure voices were heard and that the event was peaceful.

Another factor that helped, Strange said, was that Bethlehem police were not in riot gear.

“On their part, they did not escalate,” Strange said. “And we did not escalate because that was not the point.”

She also said they had people who put themselves between police and protesters who were shouting at officers.

“The march was there so people could be heard,” Strange said. “This was the place where they needed to express their anger. People were not there to destroy property. They were there to be heard. And because they felt like they were heard they didn’t need to destroy property.”

DiLuzio said he was horrified after learning of how Floyd died.

“No time in the 40 years I’ve been a police officer have I ever been trained to, or heard of kneeling on someone’s throat as proper police procedure,” DiLuzio said. “The first thing I said when I saw the video was, ‘This is horrible and this is wrong.’ I don’t know any cops who have said that that cop was justified. This is something that the police and protesters can agree on. That picture is a bad image for American law enforcement.”