ESPRESSO’ s lead story describes a conflict between the SDPD’s Vice Squad and small entertainment venues of all kinds, including the many coffeehouses inside city limits concerning the rise of fees for yearly entertainment permits. The sharp increases in yearly costs for such permits are extraordinarily high and coupled with similar permit increases for the many things a cafe’ needs to operate here, the bureaucracy-inspired gouge of small businesses is threatening to their survival. Those causing the threat intend to impose a choice on San Diegans between security or culture. What San Diegans don’t know is that those forcing the change have stacked the deck against the good guys.

When times get tight and profit is down, a common mistake made by people with no business acumen is to raise prices for what they sell. In the case of city services, regulation is what they sell and their market is captive; every business has to buy–or else. Bureaucrats take it for granted that their budgets are sacrosanct and that all businesses roll in profits so going to the goose for another golden egg to keep the wheels of bureaucracy speeding along is the natural thing to do. It’ s a good thing people who think that way have government jobs because they’ d starve in the real world, but I’m getting ahead of myself.

SDPD is one such odd-thinking entity. Its Vice Squad regulates entertainment venues and in sets the rates for entertainment permits in San Diego and its new fees for them is based on a “quote cost recovery” approach that says that businesses regulated by Vice have to cough up all the coin Vice needs for its yearly budget. Permits for entertainment are source number one for this revenue. Other sources are licenses for holistic health practitioners, second hand dealers, bars, peep shows and other businesses that might become sources for crime. Entertainment venues of all kinds are seen as by Vice as fronts for drug and gang activity. This view has been around for the last half century if not longer. Of late, Vice no longer publishes its budget. It’ s budget is whatever they say it is and since SDPD has lost its media relations person and now requires emailed questions to be sent to whomever is on the end of a phone line with the usual bureaucratic lapses in returning messages as their usual tactic, news of their budget is likely to stay secret for longer than is good for business and the customers of those venues. Those who have a passing acquaintance with medieval Italian history will recognize a Black Hand when they see one. The tactics and philosophy of paying for “service” is no different from paying for “protection” . In San Diego the practices are elegantly indirect, combined and even lawful. They’re so smooth that even the rest of media can overlook them without breaking a sweat.

At the bottom of what appears to be a mere hike in fees is a sea change in thinking by the PD on how it earns its living. Vice has changed its form from a taxpayer paid, impartial function of government to a cash hungry predator looking to its ” customers” for increased revenue. This makes real what some libertarians have long yearned for–government function paid for entirely by those who consume it. What the crackpot theory doesn’t take into account is that government—in this case the PD—can force businesses to be their captive pockets to be picked.

Small venues perform some services that often go unsung: in the case of the coffeehouses, not only do they sell the caffein that keeps the citizens going through the motions daily, but many of them also provide small stages for new performers making their way into the mainstream. San Diego’ s coffeehouses can list some stellar names among those who started here: Jim Morrison of the Doors began at the Upper Cellar for starters; Tom Waits, Frank Zappa, The Cascades, Jewel, Blink 182 and many others are some others who began in the local coffee scene and the places they play in have discovered that entertainment pays if it’ s easy, cheap and unusual. Such elements are a way to make a local culture happen and grow. Making it much harder for those small venues to provide entertainment and afford SDPD is a direct threat against the growth of culture here. Every dime that disappears into the no longer public Vice budget is a deduction from creativity, talent, good music and a more human-scale society that allows some performers to provide what they know their public wants to hear. The higher cost of entertainment fee permits isn’t just more money for the cops—it’ s theft from business and and creatives in those businesses that shape the culture. It’s the inverse of the cops’ twisted assertion that entertainment equals crime; law enforcement equals suppression of things that make a community one’s own.

This shouldn’t be tolerated. Businesses do not need to work for the PD and creatives don’t need some secret editor making their music more difficult to find. Someday, the business community that is target number one for this odious kind of thing will have to get smart enough to organize effectively and lean on politicians long enough to push back against the City. If they don’t, they’ll find what every poor schmuck finds who gets convinced to pay for “protection”— that the cost always goes up and the terms won’t just bankrupt them, but directly harm everyone around them, too.

Santos Coffeehouse is one of San Diego’s unsung roasters. The little coffeehouse at 32nd and Thorn in North Park has long served its own coffees in a surprising variety of blends, flavors and decafs for a decade and their hidden roastery supplies coffees to a growing number of San Diego restaurants that like the consistency and taste. We had two samples; an espresso which is the house’s own and a city roast . We revelled at the espresso, pulled in our own antic MyPressi, but even that tiny machine got some excellent sweetness and fine crema from the beans and we were rewarded with a lingering finish. The coffee was even, the beans were same sized without chaff, char or cracked beans and overall it was impressive and ranks alongside any espresso anywhere. The city had a sharper, more aggressive flavor, though with a fine nose and longer aftertaste. Just the ticket for a spicy breakfast. Santos offers a variety of worthy coffees daily. Find them at 3191 Thorn, 92104. 619. 640-3376.

Fine Kona from Blue Moon is sharp, snappy, bright and poppy—just what you expect from a Kona. An even, clean dark roast with a variety of bean sizes are present, as is a smooth mouth-feel and mellow aftertaste. Though some Konas can be acidy, this one is mild and makes for a fine brew to mull all day. Its a forgiving coffee, yielding as much flavor from a drip pot as a french press and is a great value for the money at $26 for 16 ounces. www.bluemoonkonacoffee.com

Bird Rock Coffee Roasters has been getting lots of mileage lately; winning “coffee of the year” from the SCAA for their Colombian Buenavista Carlos Imbachi; a plum-like, mellow full city roast that has a fine finish and is a great port and brie kind of coffee. Pictured at left is their Haraaz Supreme; a Yemeni hand-picked bean grown in ecologically pure conditions. The light roast yields up a fruity, tart cup that has some great high notes and a pleasant nose. The coffee was rated highly in the August Food & Wine magazine for its overall cup quality and we think they hit the nail on the head. Along with these offerings Bird Rock is now selling a wonderful aged Blue Batak from Indonesia. This peaberry gives a mellow, smoky flavor with a taste of licorice We found it excellent in a french press and think it’s just the thing to go with a richer, heavier feast of meat, sauces and bold tastes. This bean will stay right with them. www.birdrockcoffeeroasters.com

“Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly. Never again can we afford to live with the narrow, provincial “outside agitator” idea. Anyone who lives inside the United States can never be considered an outsider anywhere within its bounds.”
— Martin Luther King Jr., Letter from Birmingham Jail
Marcos da Silva came to the United States on a student visa in 2001. He had a desire to learn English and continue his exploration of music; a passion of his. Marcos connected with like-minded people in San Diego and formed a band that made the rounds and usual precarious living common to musicians everywhere. He had no criminal record and as far as can be determined, lived a peaceful life with numerous friends.
On Saturday, March 27,  Marcos da Silva’s band left San Diego for Lake Havasu, where they planned to play as part of a music benefit for a hospice. After crossing the Arizona border  just outside of Yuma along I-8, Marcos discovered that his student visa had expired. He was now an illegal alien in the United States; he had exactly 15 days left to live.
Marcos was quickly arrested at the first checkpoint east of Yuma by the Border Patrol, who immediately zeroed in on the foreign man. Pulling him aside from the others, they grilled him on his university studies, his student loans and other activities related to education prior to his arrest. His American companions were separated and asked similar questions about him. As is usual in any arrest, suspicious items are taken away from the prisoner; among the items on da Silva was a bottle of pills needed to treat a heart ailment; these were an experimental medication prescribed by UCSD Medical Center. Though he and his friends told the arresting agents that those pills were critical to Marcos’ health, and that da Silva wore a pacemaker to regulate his heartbeat and that his heart worked at perhaps 20 percent of normal capacity unaided by medication, the agents responded that they weren’t doctors and knew nothing about—and were not required to care for—medical conditions. One salient comment stuck with the driver, a man named Ken Deaumont, who recalled an agent pointing at da Silva and saying, “People like him bankrupt the system.” Their pleas fell on deaf ears; the bottle of pills was separated from the prisoner. There was nothing any of da Silva’s friends could do to change that, either.
Marcos da Silvas’ separation from his bottle of pills when he was handcuffed and arrested led directly to his medical deterioration and subsequent death.
Marcos was taken into custody and held for 48 hours. On March 30,  he was to meet with a federal judge in a deportation hearing. He was transferred to several detention centers during this time and on March 31, he arrived at the federal Elroy Detention Center in Arizona.
By this time, Marcos’ health was deteriorating. His lack of medicine and the stress of arrest and confinement, inability to eat a prison diet contraindicated by his medical condition, to say nothing of the shackles, terror and fear of other inmates led to a collapse.
On Thursday, April 1, doctors at Elroy  realized Marcos  was in danger and they had him transferred to nearby Casa Grande Hospital. He spent three days there in intensive care. During this time, Marcos’ friends contacted the honorary consul of Brazil, Brad Brendan, in Phoenix, for assistance. The honorary consul tried negotiating various means to free da Silva without success.
On April 5, friends and associates organized a search to finally locate where he was being held. One of them located Marcos at the hospital; he and the rest rushed to visit , only to be told they did not have authorization to visit da Silva.
Once da Silva was stabilized, he was returned to Elroy Detention Center where he received notice to continue the case in the Federal Court in San Diego. Released on his own recognizance, he was given a return bus ticket. Ill, bewildered and with no way to get to the bus station, the Brazilian honorary consul arranged to drive him to catch his bus back to San Diego.
On April 8, Marcos rode the bus from Casa Grande to El Centro.  He carried with him a court summons and a few remaining pills for his heart ailment.
It isn’t known whether he misread his bus ticket or if there was some other error; what is known is that he spent the night in the bus station and walked to the nearest ATM to withdraw enough funds to purchase the remainder of his ticket early the next morning.   Marcos arrived in San Diego the following day, and spent the night at a friend’s home.
By April 10, Marcos’ condition deteriorated further; this was presumed to be from the stress of the arrest and imprisonment, the desert heat and the break from his medication. He was taken to UCSD Hospital and placed in the intensive care unit.
On April 11, Marcos began having multiple heart attacks and was placed in an induced coma.
On April 12, Marcos died of heart failure. Doctors at UCSD attributed his death directly to his loss of medication, complicated by high stress. An autopsy is pending. There was a memorial on April 25.
By April 22, news of Marcos da Silva’s death made headlines in Brazil. Media in that country have kept the dead man alive in commentary for over a week and highlights of immigration crackdowns in the US have focused much attention on this country in terms of one of their citizens who died at the hands of uncaring Yankees, attempting—and failing to save money on his incarceration.