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To: Liam Garland, Berkeley Director of Public Works Dee Williams-Ridley, Berkeley City Manager Mayor and Council, City of Berkeley

I found out today that the City is planning to install an 8 ½ foot tall, 10 ½ foot long public toilet – Portland Loo is the brand – directly in front of A People’s History of Telegraph Avenue (The People’s Park Mural) on the side of Amoeba records at the corner of Haste and Telegraph. I designed that mural, initiated the project, and painted it together with a group of extraordinary artists – O’Brien Thiele, Daniel Galvez, Hannah Kransberg and others. O’Brien and I have worked together to preserve this mural for 45 years.

When I heard the plan for a mural-blocking toilet, I was astounded, saddened, outraged. If I was British, I might say, gobsmacked. I’ve painted other murals. I’ve let them go. But this one? No.

“Really?”, I thought. The City can’t find any place to install a toilet except smack dab in front of my mural – our mural? And somehow that’s okay? To permanently obscure the view of a mural, which has been a Berkeley landmark since it was painted in 1976, and which was officially landmarked in 1990; a mural which is still the only memorial in the city (and perhaps anywhere) to the events that gave Berkeley its reputation as a place where people struggle for the betterment of human kind, for the end of stupid brutal wars, for the elimination of racism, for freedom of speech, and for life free from repressive strictures on how to dress, whom to love, and how to wear your hair. All those freedoms this mural celebrates.

And you want to put a toilet in front of it.  

Have you ever stood and watched, say on homecoming day, or the first day of college for freshmen, when parents drive their children to the gates of the University and drop them off to begin their journey towards adulthood, and have you seen how many come and stand in front of the mural to get a history lesson and how many step across the street to take a picture? Now what will they bring home? A snapshot with a toilet in the foreground. 

It is only by sheer luck that I found out about the plan for a mural-blocking toilet. No one bothered to give me or O’Brien, or any of the other muralists a heads up. I found out today, Sunday. I’m told the deadline to submit comments is Monday. I’m told there was one meeting for public comment. Rigel Robinson sent out a newsletter to his constituents announcing it on Friday, October 1. The meeting was Monday, October 4. I I’m told that only three or four members of the public attended. I’m told that only two locations were offered as options. One of them was in front of the Framer’s Workshop on Channing Way. I’m told the owner of that establishment was present. Maybe they got the newsletter. I’m told they objected because they were concerned about flies. We’re not talking about an outhouse, with an open hole, and a roll of toilet paper sitting next to it, and may be a creaky wooden door. We’re talking about a very fancy modern engineered structure. What flies? I can understand maybe they don’t want a public toilet in front of their establishment, although I could also imagine it could become a destination for people who really have to go and who might, with gratitude, having relieved themselves, look around and say, for example, “Oh, the Framer’s Workshop, just the place to bring that old photograph of grandma we've always loved.” 

Surely there are other possible locations for this much-needed Portland Loo. Like, even a few feet further up Haste. Or on the triangle at Dwight Way. Or . . .. 

Don’t do this. 

If you do, I suspect you will be inundated with outraged letters from people who care about this mural, who have cared about it for decades, and who perhaps care about it even more now as plans are well afoot to build on People’s Park. I saw an announcement of those plans in Rigel Robinson’s newsletter. It included the expression of an intent to “Establish a public memorial in celebration of the park’s past and meaning.” 

That’s what we painted 45 years ago! 

That’s why people call it the “People’s Park Mural. 

And now you want to block 10 ½ feet of it with your toilet. What section will it be? Maybe the section depicting the Free-Speech Movement, with Mario Savio’s words from the famous speech he gave standing atop the police car on Sproul Plaza: 

There's a time when the operation of the machine becomes so odious, makes you so sick at heart that you can't take part! You can't even passively take part! And you've got to put your bodies upon the gears and upon the wheels, upon the levers, upon all the apparatus -- and you've got to make it stop! And you've got to indicate to the people who run it, to the people who own it -- that unless you're free the machine will be prevented from working at all!! 

I quote this section in full as it appears on the mural. I think it’s important for people to see it, to read it, to know it. Perhaps more important than ever. We need all the help we can get not to be overwhelmed with fear and loathing, to keep up the struggle, to preserve our courage during these terrible times I worry that people might interpret the placing of the Portland Loo in front of the mural as the City giving the middle finger to the memory of the struggle for People’s Park, and use Mario’s words as license to wreak havoc on the Portland Loo. The need to poop and pee, should not be in conflict with the need for free speech, the need to remember the past, and the need for art that embodies our collective memory. 

So it’s simple. Don’t do this. It would be a colossal mistake. For 45 years this mural has been largely free from graffiti. It’s been protected by the people. Now it needs protection from government. The rare occasional graffiti we can scrub off. This 10 ½-foot-long, 8 ½-foot-high impediment will not be so easily removed. Find another location. 

Sincerely, 

Osha