What's Up With Smoking Weed and Loitering In Front of Businesses During A Festival?

Got a chance last weekend to observe public behavior during an annual area event. I was shocked by the number of times marijuana users from my community undisciplined sector loitered on busy sidewalks in front of downtown businesses and billowed fumes like smoke stacks.

There was no sense of shame nor discretion. Not even in a high-end business district full of cameras, police officers and patrolling National Guardsmen. The city's decriminalization of open marijuana smoking and national decline in acceptable behavior colluded once again.

I also noticed how many peers of open weed smokers would loiter by the hundreds on nearby sidewalks and streets. Despite being surrounded by bars and restaurants, loiterers stood around chatting. Not spending money. The fact they were in the way of purposeful pedestrians was lost on them.

Despite an array of police and military resources, I still had to ask myself, what's up with smoking weed and loitering in front of businesses during a festival? Such conduct is better suited for the 'hood instead of a high-end tourist destination.

It's also a sure source of unnecessary confrontations and fatal incidents-including a mass shooting at festival conclusion last year. Make loiterers move around if they aren't watching a performance-which is the purpose of festivals-or waiting to be seated by a bar or restaurant.

And ticket or arrest public weed smokers, which is still against Louisiana state law.

Nadra Enzi aka Cap Black addresses 'anti safety' theory and policies through advocacy and consulting.

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