Why I am Participating

By Chip Py on June 27th, 2007

I am a longtime resident of Silver Spring. Back in the mid nineties through my involvement with the Greater Silver Spring Chamber of Commerce and what was then called the Silver Spring Urban District, I participated in many of the activities leading up to the development of the new Downtown Silver Spring.

I have many hobbies and one of them is Photography. One could describe the kind of pictures that I take as “Urban Landscape”. Through the popular photography website Flickr, I participate in a photography group known as “DC Neighborhoods” where we pick a neighborhood, photograph its character and ambiance, and then post it to this site to share with the group and others.

Last Tuesday, I went to downtown Silver Spring, had lunch, and then took out my camera and standing on Ellsworth Avenue, I began taking shots of the buildings with the blue sky and clouds as a backdrop. Almost immediately, a security guard approached and told me “there was no picture taking allowed in Downtown Silver Spring.” What do you mean” I said, “I am on a city street, in a public place, taking pictures is a right that I have protected by the first amendment.” The guard told me to report to the management office.

There, Stacy Horan informed me that Downtown Silver Spring including Ellsworth Avenue is private property, not a public place, and subject to the rules of the Peterson Companies. They have a no photography policy to “Protect them from people who might want to use the photographs as part of a story in which they could write bad things about us.”

And she told me that many of the chain stores in Downtown Silver Spring don’t what their “concepts” to be photographed for security reasons. There was also a concern that I might sell my photographs and that is not allowed. I told her that I was well aware of my rights to take pictures on public property, any pictures that I take I have a right to sell, and questioned how they could have a policy that limits our individual rights when Downtown Silver Spring was built with public money.

I found out later that it is true Ellsworth Avenue was turned over to Peterson Companies through the process of condemnation. So now I’m wondering: If this is a $1.2 billion public/private investment as stated in Tuesday’s New York Times article about the downtown renaissance, where do the public’s rights end and the private corporations policies takeover??

In discussing this with fellow Silver Spring residents I have been told that we are not allowed to campaign, petition or protest in Downtown Silver Spring. These are basic American values, true to our beliefs, and in the Downtown Silver Spring they are banned?? In this age of eroding individual rights should the people of Silver Spring accept this??

It is my understanding that the county continues to spend public funds promoting Downtown Silver Spring and I wouldn’t discourage this, but I think that the county should have a conversation with the Peterson Companies about their policies in regards to these basic American values and freedoms.

I don’t think that the people of this county are willing to trade their rights of free speech or the right to petition assemble and protest in their own downtown for a Starbucks or a Potbelly’s.

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