From Oregon Live
A dozen city employees today plan to finish clearing Chapman and Lownsdale squares of debris and trash so engineers and horticulture experts can survey damage to the parks’ structures and trees.
City officials expect the parks to be closed for at least one week. Weeks of camping by Occupy Portland at the two downtown parks have torn up grass and damaged plant beds.
he’s walked through the two parks periodically since the occupation began.
“I’m not really surprised,” Downing said. “It was what we expected it to be.”
Downing said about 70 dump trucks hauled trash and debris from the camps over the weekend. He said about 30 city employees worked Sunday to clear the parks.
Once the trash is gone, the city will bring in a team comprised of specialists to look at the health and condition of the trees, plants, the restrooms and the art in the parks. The turf will need to be reseeded, he said. He expects the once grassy areas to be “pretty bare” until February.
Downing said he hopes that at least the walkways will be open soon so the public can have access to the parks again.
Hope they are careful when cleaning and don’t get pricked by any of the used hypodermic needles left lying around by the drug users. And I hope they get all of the needles so that some innocent child doesn’t find one and get hurt. Of course, the OWS folks will claim that it wasn’t THEM who trashed the park, because they claim that they clean up after themselves. Sorry folks, but the evidence it there that your protesters are nasty, trashy people who think that they should have maid service.
It’s funny how the OWS people claim to represent the 99%, yet want to disown any touble makers participating in their protests. They claim to have thousands supporting them, so they want to include the bad element in the numbers being reported, but want to disown them otherwise. They can’t have it both ways.