In late June, a group of Big Island residents parked their cars along Kinoole Street and stood next to Lincoln Park, holding up colorful handmade signs. Some of the cars had “Take Back Lincoln Park” written on their windows. Some signs read “Honk Against Hate,” others referenced “Big Island Aloha.”
In late June, a group of Big Island residents parked their cars along Kinoole Street and stood next to Lincoln Park, holding up colorful handmade signs. Some of the cars had “Take Back Lincoln Park” written on their windows. Some signs read “Honk Against Hate,” others referenced “Big Island Aloha.”
The group was there to protest the actions of James Borden, who for the past five years has parked a truck adjacent to Lincoln Park, where he has displayed signs containing anti-President Barack Obama, anti-Islam and anti-abortion messages.
The signs have drawn numerous protests and complaints over the years, with people objecting not only to the messages but to their placement so close to a park where children play.
When Borden displayed an image of a bloody fetus this summer, the feeling for many, as Take Back Lincoln Park co-organizer Beverly Yates-Tese said, was that “enough is enough.”
Co-organizers Karen Nishimoto and Heather Kimball had created a Facebook page to let people know about the new protest effort. The group (it currently has just under 200 members) became tight-knit, but, Yates-Tese said, “we decided that us standing out here wasn’t going to be a long-term resolution.”
After the sign-makers left the parking spaces, Borden returned with his truck, although it no longer featured the fetus photo (in a previous interview with the Tribune-Herald, he said the image “did what it needed to do”).
The Take Back Lincoln Park effort also continues. Organizers are now working to hold county officials accountable for enforcement of codes that are already in place, and to make the park more family- and keiki-oriented.
“(People) may not see that things are happening, but they need to remember that things do not happen overnight,” Yates-Tese said.
The group held a Family Fun Day at Lincoln Park earlier this summer that drew a number of residents for face-painting, food and games. And today from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m., there will be an Ohana Day program at the park, featuring hula performances and a full concert lineup, along with activities for keiki.
“We have the right to have a place that we can go as a community, especially as taxpayers who pay to keep the park clean, who pay the county … We have the right to be able to come here and enjoy ourselves,” Nishimoto said.
The group organizers said that they were sensitive to Borden’s First Amendment rights of free speech, but they questioned the location of his messages.
“We wouldn’t be here without the First Amendment (either),” Yates-Tese said. “It’s not about stopping anybody from saying what they believe and doing what they want to do, it’s about the appropriateness of where.”
She said one person in the group had compared Borden’s signs to an R-rated movie.
“You can’t take a child to a rated-R movie without parental consent … and we don’t get the choice of whether or not someone gets to see that,” she said.
Kimball said in a letter that she and her children used to visit Lincoln Park two to three times per week, but that “it no longer feels like a safe and nurturing place to take my kids.”
“Our main message is the park needs to be used for what its intended purpose was — for families, for the community,” Yates-Tese said. “Not for political purposes or any type of agenda whatsoever.”
Members of the Take Back Lincoln Park group don’t ask for each other’s personal viewpoints on controversial subjects, she said, because “that’s not why we’re here.”
“We are here talking about the safety, the happiness, the enjoyment that our keiki should have here in the park,” Yates-Tese said. She noted that the focal point of the park is its giant play structure.
In some cities, like New York City and Miami, ordinances are in place prohibiting adults from being at a playground unless they are with a child who is the appropriate age to use the facility.
Nishimoto said that a similar ordinance at Lincoln Park would also help address smoking, drinking, drug use and after-hours use.
“You can drive by in the evening, and see people in the park, and you’re thinking, ‘It’s closed,’” Yates-Tese said.
Part of the group’s mission is to hold public officials accountable for enforcement of rules, particularly as they apply to the county sign code.
Yates-Tese said she has the county sign code practically memorized.
“I have it saved in my phone, on my computer … I can get it at any point in time, just in case,” she said.
Hawaii County’s sign code was last updated in 2008. According to Section 3-7, portable signs are prohibited in all districts. This definition includes signs designed to be transported: “Signs attached to or painted on vehicles parked and visible from any public street, park, other public place or pedestrian way, unless said vehicle is driven in the normal day-to-day operation of the business.”
Section 3-9 states that temporary signs are allowed within public parks and on public streets, but must be permitted. Temporary signs are defined as those pertaining to an event, meeting or series of meetings.
The codes mean nothing if no one is out enforcing them, Nishimoto said.
“It’s more of, ‘Where does the (enforcement) responsibility lie?” Yates-Tese said.
She said she had spoken with various departments, including Parks and Recreation and the Department of Public Works, to place complaints, and was setting up meetings with County Council members.
“We’re hoping that there will be some sort of positive change,” Yates-Tese said. “Not even really much of a change. It’s just an enforcement of what should already have been happening.”