The primary problem appears to be that Council members tend to defer to the Council member in whose ward a situation exists, which places this parking issue squarely in the lap of Councilwoman Sue Benham, reputedly an advocate of abortion.  The pro-life members of the Council apparently do not want to base any of their actions on their pro-life convictions, so they need to be provided with strategies for opposing these restrictions which do not involve the necessity of exposing the way in which abortion is harming our own community and the way in which ministries to help rescue women and children from abortion benefit our community.

But regardless of the life-and-death issues involved (as if those weren’t the most important!) here are some important points which should help every Council member to see that to serve the public interest, the parking restrictions need to be removed.

• Off-street parking: FPA has full control of three separate off-street parking areas.  Other businesses which have requested timed parking changes in the past 18 months have not had their own off-street parking areas.  Because it has ample parking in its own lot, FPA should not be allowed to control the adjacent public parking areas, especially when there are hundreds of members of the public who have notified the City of their need to park in this area for more than 30 minutes at a time.
• The "policy" is not consistently applied: City staff’s claim that the timed parking requests from businesses are always granted is false.  In early 2008, a business on 17th Street presented an offical "Request for Signing and Marking" to City staff, indicating their desire that "no signs [would] be present" on the street outside the business, which provides services which require their customers to be on site for more than 30 minutes at a time.  The customers were being ticketed for violating a 30 minute parking zone outside the business, so the business owner clearly had a legitimate business reason for the request.  Nevertheless, staff did not remove the signs as requested, but instead erected new 30 minute parking signs.  Tim Palmquist notified the City staff of this on June 25, but his call has never been returned.  This parking request was one of only three requests for timed parking since the beginning of 2008 other than the FPA (most parking requests handled by City staff relate to handicapped parking spaces, not timed parking).   The 17th Street business has no off-street parking. Clearly, in spite of staff’s claims to the contrary, a consistent policy has not existed and/or has not been enforced.
• First Amendment issues: Correspondence between the FPA abortion business representative and the City staff clearly indicates that these parking restrictions were always intended to discriminate against those who frequent these public streets to pray and seek to save children and their mothers from the violence of abortion.
• Fourteenth Amendment issues: Enforcement of these parking restrictions has also been viewpoint-based, targeting those who participate in the life-saving ministry while ignoring others. (Attorney Catherine Short of Life Legal Defense Foundation sent a letter to the Council and Mayor on June 24 documenting these Constitutional issues in this case.)
• Inconsistencies: The timed parking throughout this area is full of inconsistencies.  Every possible timed parking restriction is represented in nearby blocks.  Such inconsistencies render structured enforcement of timed parking to be virtually impossible.
• Public interest: The voice of the public should be considered when a significant number of citizens expresses concern about parking on public streets. In the case of the restrictions at 25th and H, approximately 800 local residents have indicated in writing their need to park in this area for more than 30 minutes. Many of these signatures also represent nearby businesses which oppose the 30 minute parking restriction.
• Safety issues: Many people who frequent 25th and H Streets (to pray for those entering the abortion facility) bring along small children, who now must cross these busy streets more often because of the parking restrictions.  Contrary to the insinuation included in the June 22 staff report to the Council on this issue, those who participate in efforts to save children and their mothers from abortion consistently strive to follow laws.  The allegations alluded to in the staff report relate primarily to complaints against the signs displayed by prayer vigil participants, and the use of signs is clearly a First Amendment issue.

If you have not yet written a letter to the Mayor and/or Bakersfield City Council member who represents your area , please do so now.  If you previously sent a letter, please place a phone call or send a follow-up letter requesting a response to these issues.

It appears at this point that we will once again be expressing our concerns at the next City Council meeting, Wednesday July 29 at 5 pm.  Please consider coming to the meeting to express your concerns or just to stand with us in prayer.

Contact information for the Council and Mayor:

• Bakersfield Mayor Harvey Hall mayor@ci.bakersfield.ca.us
• Council member Irma Carson (Ward 1, southeast and south-central Bakersfield)
• Council member Sue Benham (Ward 2, central Bakersfield, north Stockdale)  sbenham@sbcglobal.net
• Council member Ken Weir (Ward 3, northeast Bakersfield)
• Council member David Couch (Ward 4, northwest Bakersfield, north Seven Oaks)   david.couch@morganstanley.com
• Council member Harold Hanson (Ward 5, southwest Bakersfield, west Laurelglen)    hwhanson@cbbank.com
• Council member Jacquie Sullivan (Ward 6, east Laurelglen, Silver Creek, and points south)    jacquiesullivan@sbcglobal.net
• Council member Zack Scrivner (Ward 7, south Bakersfield, Valley Plaza, Greenfield)

Additional information about LifeSavers Ministries is also available on Facebook at Terri Palmquist’s brand new page and Tim Palmquist’s page.

Other circumstances relating to the staff of the FPA abortion chamber gave us sincere hope that this place of death would close by the end of 2008.

The slow abortion rate continued for about 6 weeks after the end of the fall 40 days.  But as the end of the year approached, the abortion rate climbed steadily.  Ever since the first week of 2009, the Bakersfield abortion chamber has been extremely busy.  One day the abortionist even stayed until after 9 pm, with several post-abortion women exiting at this late hour!  (One of these women, a teenage girl, was heard talking to her mother on a cell phone, trying to explain why she was so late as she walked away from the place of death with an empty womb.  "Oh, Mom," she said, "you know I stay out late all the time."   Obviously her mother didn’t know that her grandchild had just been killed.)

Sadly, we have heard that Bakersfield is not the only city which has witnessed an increase in abortions in the past few months.  Some blame the increased death toll on economic conditions, others point to the new political climate, with the new U.S. President seeming to give his approval to the killing of tiny innocent children.

But God’s glory shines best in the darkest of hours.  This time of "crisis" in our nation is a perfect time for God’s people to rise up and show that God is greater than any of our problems.  This is a perfect opportunity for us to join together in prayer and see how God can turn around even the most hopeless situation.  We have seen God use 40 Days for Life to make a significant impact against the culture of death, not only locally but across the nation.  And we know that He can do it again.

The abortion center seems to be trying to abort as many babies as possible before the start of 40 Days for Life .

A few hours later, Sister Paula from Nicaragua arrived on the sidewalks outside the killing center.  She is on a mission trip to the United States and she had heard about us so she wanted to stop by and meet us.

When she heard about the busy morning and hostile reactions at the abortion business, Sister Paula spent time praying around the building.

Sister Paula runs a maternity home in western Nicaragua.

As I write, a year ago today, my dear friend’s daughter died. She was 22, beautiful, healthy and pregnant. Laura Hope Smith died on an abortion table. Her doctor was a Harvard trained ObGyn. It doesn’t seem possible that she would die, because we are told and assume that legal abortions are safe. Her parents did not even know she was pregnant until the ER doctor called to report her death. Can you imagine their shock? It was too late to save her. By the time they got to her, their worst nightmare was realized when they identified her body. She was on a slab in the basement of the hospital where she was taken.

Even though Laura was not a minor, I would like to address Sarah’s Law (Proposition 4). For the sake of our daughters, parents need to know when an under-age girl is contemplating such a dangerous surgical procedure.  If she has an abortion without their knowledge and survives, but then developes an infection and they don’t know to watch for it, she could die from the infection. Tragically, this has happened when parents thought their daughters just had the flu.  Also, after an abortion, parents need to be aware and watchful concerning their daughter’s mental health.

As you can see, this is serious. Lives are at stake. You never know; this could happen to someone you love.

Please vote Yes on Proposition 4.

I write this in Laura’s memory. Parents, siblings, friends and a fiance grieve and miss her. She was loved.

• More information on Laura Hope Smith
• More information on Proposition 4

To the little one who was in the womb.
We are sorry your life ended so soon.
Was your mother scared? Did she feel all alone?
Perhaps she was hungry, without a home.
Maybe she felt she had nowhere to turn,
that she and her baby were no one’s concern.
Who was your daddy? Did he even care?
Did he have any clue your mom had a secret to share?
Where were you grandparents, pastor or friends?

If they were there would your life have come to an end?
Did your mom know of the help we provide,
do you think if she did you might still be alive?

Listen to the service .

For the past several years, Pastor Beilstein has been seeking a way to establish a pregnancy help center in Taft. The LifeHouse pregnancy help center opened earlier this year, but not in time to save baby Noah.

Click here for links to news reports on the memorial service.