What you're crappin' in Vegas better not lay in Vegas

What you're crappin' in Vegas better not lay in Vegas

Posted 08.21.2006 by GottaGoGirl

Seven steps. That's how far it is from my side of the bed to the bathroom door. Just seven short steps. Which means that if I lived in Las Vegas, I could be arrested! Because a new Las Vegas ordinance that bans using the outdoors as a toilet also "mistakenly" makes it illegal to sleep near a deposit of urine or feces.

Granted, the ordinance says it's illegal for any person who has urinated or defecated in a public place to "fail to clean or remove the material deposited" immediately, and makes it a misdemeanor offense to go to the bathroom in a public place unless it's in an "appropriate sanitary facility." But it also contains a provision making it illegal to "knowingly establish" temporary, portable, or open sleeping quarters within five hundred feet of any deposit of urine or feces, unless that deposit is made in an appropriate sanitary facility.

Asked about the sleeping-near-feces provision on Thursday, Las Vegas City Attorney Brad Jerbic said it got into the ordinance by mistake, and will not be enforced. "We were reviewing all park rules, including sleeping, camping and a number of other things people associate with parks," he said. "The decision, by me, was to take this (provision) out of the defecation/urination bill and look at it with respect to park rules in general. It was my mistake that it didn't come out."

(Those last few words made this PoopReporter giggle, just a bit.)

"Seriously, are you kidding me?" asked Lee Rowland, public advocate for the American Civil Liberties Union of Nevada. "I don't know how on earth a police officer would determine whether someone has knowingly set up shop next to ‘urine or feces.'"

A lack of public toilets sometimes makes it impossible for homeless people to find an "appropriate facility." Jerbic said the provision wouldn't have targeted the homeless, but is meant to address public health issues. "We are talking about camping or sleeping near unsanitary conditions," he said.

Jerbic said he plans to talk to public health officials about what is a safe distance to camp from "unsanitary conditions." When the measure does appear again, the "allowed" distance between sleepers and urine or feces will be much shorter than five hundred feet.

Is Las Vegas targeting the homeless? Or is this really a health issue, as they state? SHOULD the homeless have the right to crap anywhere they want to crap and then camp nearby? What about houses that don't have plumbing, as they many PoopReporters have described? And what about DOG poop and piss? Every park I've ever visited, there are dogs running around everywhere, and even if the owners clean up the dogs' poop (and some DON'T), the critters most assuredly piss EVERYWHERE. Almost ANYWHERE a homeless person "camped" would be right atop a "deposit" of urine. Does THAT violate the ordinance? And how is any of this enforceable?

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pcpooper (13) -- 08.21.2006

Some of the laws and ordinances they come up with these days :-\.

Tydirium (516) -- 08.21.2006

It is pretty ridiculous. It's also scary that errant laws can "come through." How many other laws on teh books are giving us grief simply because the lawmakers were too ignorant to think them through?

However, it does seem like they're backpeddling -- they probably wrote this law specifically to harrass homeless people, only they've realized it was far too broad.

When I was a kid, they put in a curfew law for kids under 18, saying you can't be out past 1 am, but they only enforced it for "gangbangers." Basically, they put laws on the books and use them to justify harrassing people or groups they want to harrass anyway. I think they used to do that in Soviet RUssia, too.

krzyzewskifan (55) -- 08.21.2006

So does that mean if I get really drunk, shit myself and then pass out; it is not only embarassing-it is now a crime in Vegas? What is the world coming to?

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I poop because I am...I am because I poop.

Fart Poopie (1257) -- 08.21.2006

Wouldn't you get arrested for public drunkenness anyway, krzy?

I don't think there's a problem here. They say they're not going to enforce it, and they're going to reduce the space limit anyway.
What they doo need to be cracking down on is peeing and pooping in public space.

AssBlaster2000 (1116) -- 08.21.2006

GGG, I beg to differ on the part about your bathroom being illegal. I read this article a few days ago and the law says it is only illegal to "knowingly establish temporary, portable or open sleeping quarters within 500 feet of any deposit of urine or feces, unless that deposit is made in an appropriate sanitary facility." So home bathrooms are OK. It's really only outdoor sleeping they're going after.

What struck me most funny in the article was that at the end, they give their reasons for not including sleeping near vomit as part of the law. They say that "[t]he council didn't want to impact people who might be ill" and "[t]he idea was that urinating or defecating in public is a conscious decision." Wow. OBVIOUSLY no member of the Las Vegas City Council has ever read a page of PoopReport, or experienced a bout of food-poisoning or alcohol-induced diarrhea, or drank too many beers and had to piss or shit without being 100% *conscious*. How I would have loved to have been a fly on the wall during that meeting.

I wonder, do one's pants count as an "appropriate sanitary facility?"

krzyzewskifan (55) -- 08.22.2006

Fart Poopie: Not if I would do that on my own front yard, because it is completely legal for me to drink in my house and to sleep on my lawn, but the way I see this law it would make shitting myself and sleeping in it, outdoors, illegal.

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I poop because I am...I am because I poop.

SamDamnit (1192) -- 08.22.2006

I think this law is very handy. If you see one of those pesky homeless people sleeping in your neighborhood, you can just shit on them and call the police. Problem solved.
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Sir SamDamnit!
The Prince of Poop

GottaGoGirl (2616) -- 08.22.2006

AB2K- You're right. It probably should have read something more like "If my toilet backed up and I was waiting for the plumber and pooped in the trash can while I was waiting, but then fell asleep..."

Or something like that.

Lame comment! -1 point

Double Flush (604) -- 08.22.2006

I like that idea, SamDamnit!, though I never have a problem with someone sleeping in my yard unless it's me, which is perfectly fine. I don't get "visitors," nor do I live in Nevada... oh well.

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"Double the flush, double the fun" --The Amazing Anus

SamDamnit (1192) -- 08.22.2006

I don't really have a problem with the homeless. I would prefer to use the technique on door to door salespeople or religous fanatics that bother me in my home.
_______
Sir SamDamnit!
The Prince of Poop

Fart Poopie (1257) -- 08.24.2006

I hear ya, Sam. Salesmen always seem to knock on my door and ring the doorbell when my youngest is taking a nap.
Anyone know where businesses get those "no soliciting" stickers?

GottaGoGirl (2616) -- 08.24.2006

FP, when I was a kid, I made a sign for our door that said, "WARNING! VIOLENT DAY SLEEPER!" I then drew cartoons of a woman (my mom) in pajamas, stabbing a man with a briefcase, with blood running down the page and puddling at the bottom. There in the puddle, it read, "Ring Bell At Your Own Risk!"

She kept that up for YEARS, even after she stopped swing shift. I highly recommend it; it worked very well!
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GottaGoGottaGoGottaGoRightNow!

SamDamnit (1192) -- 08.24.2006

I live in Texas, so just telling them that I am going to shoot them, works rather well.
_______
Sir SamDamnit!
The Emir of Crapistan

Fart Poopie (1257) -- 08.25.2006

LOL, GGG. How old were you? You had such a violent imagination.

GottaGoGirl (2616) -- 08.25.2006

I was 8 or 9. I had heard my mom joke several times about "getting a sign that says 'Violent Day Sleeper'", and the family would laugh. So one year for her birthday, I decided to make that sign! I think the reason she liked it so much was because it WAS a little twisted.

The briefcase man was prone, with xx for eyes, and his tongue hanging out, and my mom was raising a dagger over his body with this snarl on her face, her hair going in all directions.

It was cool. Too bad she never took a picture of it.
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GottaGoGottaGoGottaGoRightNow!

Anonymous Coward (not verified) -- 10.27.2006

I know this is soooooooo two months ago, but I wanted to let you illustrious poop fans know that the Vegas city council rescinded the sleeping near poop part of the ordinance. now it only criminalizes MAKING such "deposits" inappropriately, not sleeping with them. :)

GottaGoGirl (2616) -- 10.28.2006

Hey, thanks for the update; I was in Vegas a couple weeks ago, but couldn't find out anything about the pending ordinance. Thanks!

Miss Simone Scat (570) -- 08.21.2007

Strange law. So now I can sleep with my poop IF I wanted too? Not that I would.
Producing waste since 1967