Oshkosh Vagabond Network- OVN's Public Statement on the Law Banning Drinking in the Park -
Last night, June 16th 2026, Oshkosh Common Council passed an ordinance outlawing public drinking in the parks Opera House Square and William Waters Plaza. This ordinance was proposed by the city staff and Oshkosh Police Department. Punishment for breaking this ordinance is $75 for the citation and if we factor in the amount of money the individual would have to pay for the citation and other fees is $232. The memo created by the police states that the focus is “of any enforcement efforts on compliance, not the citation revenues.” The memo also focuses on the fact that people who commune and enjoy the parks urinate and defecate near the parks.
The people in the Oshkosh Vagabond Network are completely opposed to and condemn this ordinance in its entirety. This ordinance will cause major problems for the unhoused and underclasses in our community. The underclasses of Oshkosh are already policed to hell by the Oshkosh Police Department. The reactionary elements of the Oshkosh Police Department are going to fine these people who literally do not even have a bathroom to use. Passing laws that say they prevent people from drinking alcohol in these parks mentioned above will not deter folks from doing that in these two parks. These parks, specifically Opera House Square (aka the Sundial), are places that the unhoused and other underclass folks like to exist since there are not any other places for them to be.
The police department says that they are not focused on making money from these fines. This may or may not be true. The police can legally lie about anything. We live under capitalism, everything is about making money. So whether or not they say it is about making money for the already over funded police department it is about making money and mostly for imprisoning our unhoused friends. We say that our unhoused friends will be imprisoned for this because they do not have the money to pay $232 per violation of this ordinance and will sit in jail for this.
Criminalizing being unhoused will not make anyone safer nor give them a house. Public urination and defecation are the main topics that this ordinance would supposedly combat. Public urination and defecation is already a crime and this would, in practice, be another form of the city taking well earned money away from its own citizens. This ordinance will target our friends who happen to be unhoused, underclass, and mostly people of color. This ordinance is a form of class warfare upon us. It is a spark of the war upon black folk and other people of color. These people are suffering under the bootheel of oppression and pushing that bootheel further on the neck of the oppressed is the Oshkosh Common Council and the Oshkosh Police Department. Any furtherance of this class warfare by the common council and police department will make more folks angry at the people supposedly “leading” our city. We will not tolerate violence or the threat of implied violence towards our neighbors by the police and others in power in our city.
For solutions to these problems we are facing such as public urination and defecation, we should provide bathrooms for those that need it in those parks. For solving the littering problem, we should provide more and larger trash receptacles. For solving the disturbance of the public, we should just live and let live. People will be loud regardless of what they are or are not doing. Instead of forcing folks to drink in public and making scenes we give them a home.
This ordinance is a “bandaid solution” to the problem of the unhoused and underclass. Instead of waging class war on behalf of the bourgeoisie, wage the class war upon the bourgeoisie on behalf of the proletariat. Give these people homes. Give them decency. Give them the treatment a human deserves.
Citoyen européen Ray Hindle ✔️
Ian Stuart
Stephen Sekula
Badger State Breakdown
Black Stag