Myers Urges His Supporters to Fire Back : Activism: The ousted city attorney says SMRR should recommit itself to progressive values.

Robert M. Myers has not gone gently into that good night.

Instead, the ousted Santa Monica city attorney was front and center at a Santa Monicans for Renters Rights meeting on Saturday, delivering a clarion call to action by urging the faithful in the city’s powerful rent control organization to recommit to their progressive values.

The crowd of about 200 went wild, yelling “Bob, Bob, Bob” as the father of the rent control law stepped to the lectern.

“It’s not a very pleasant request to come and talk about your firing as city attorney,” Myers said. “But because of popular demand, I will do so.”

Myers was fired by the City Council Sept. 8 for stonewalling the council as it tried to put into place the recommendations of the city’s Task Force on Homelessness.

The former city attorney balked because he said the council was asking him to write laws that criminalize poverty, especially laws against using the city’s parks as living accommodations and regulating the use of the parks by large groups.

In his stirring remarks to the renters’ group, Myers dismissed the homeless task force report forged by a coalition of 18 citizens, many of them social service providers, as a “sellout.”

“It’s not right to sacrifice the rights of a class of people because of community pressure,” Myers said. “The homeless task force report sold out people’s rights.”

Myers said the city “should be ashamed” that it faces a threat of legal action from progressive attorneys who have vowed to sue Santa Monica for enacting laws that they say violate the civil rights of the homeless.

“Civil rights is not an impediment to government, but a goal of government,” Myers said.

Though some of his followers had threatened to work against the City Council members aligned with SMRR who had voted to dismiss him, Myers said that would not be productive.

Instead, Myers stood outside gathering signatures to force a special meeting of the renters group to adopt a progressive platform.

A four-page platform suggested by Myers and some of his allies includes the repeal of a long-standing ordinance banning sleeping overnight in city parks and a more recent ordinance restricting “encampments.” The special meeting of SMRR to consider the proposals has not been scheduled, but some in the group’s leadership said it would be after the November election.

Away from City Hall, the often taciturn Myers was voluble and outgoing as he told the group his firing was a “political decision.”

“I’m stubborn, I’m hard-working. I have dedicated a lot of time to serving people in this community,” said Myers. “I guess it was not a problem that I was a divisive character over rent control.”