When will someone help us?

[Chucky]

The crime rate in the nearest large city has gone through the roof. The area that I work in one night a week can only be described as a human sewer. All week I work in the suburbs as an armed guard for a corporation doing personal security. Sorry can say no more about that but one night a week I belong to a team that goes into the sewer and tries to reclaim stores that the punks feel are free soup kitchens. We go in force and intimation. The main problem is the younger teens that get guns from the street are without remorse using them to settle typical teen age gripes. While at that job I see young 20 an 30 yr old something men with biceps as big as my head walking around.

The mayor has taken the cops out of their cruisers and have them walking a beat. 90 Officers from surrounding towns are in there on week ends pairing up with the city cops. After the last shooting a young lady was repeating to the camera, When will someone help us? When will someone help us? This pissed me off so bad. I have an idea why don’t you help yourself for a change. Do you think if this happened in my neighbor hood that these punks would still be on the streets? What about all these big guys hanging around. Why don’t they grab these little bastards by the neck and shake the guns out of their pants?

Don’t let anyone BS you they know who the players are. We head through the mean streets at midnight for home and see 16 yr old girls pushing baby strollers with the temp at 5 %. The never ending blue strobes are flashing when we get there and when we leave. Two weeks ago an ambulance driver was shot in the chest after dropping an outstanding citizen off after a Dr. appointment. This may seem mean but the LE is worn out and feeling like they are swimming up stream every day. I say they pull out every one wearing a badge. Cops, fire, security, ems, and let them just have at it. Maybe they will start to understand the phrase it takes their village not ours to fix their village. The swishing noise you hear is steam coming out of my ears.

[Christopherstjo]

This is what they call......."reality"

[Chucky]

This is what they call......."reality"

So true. This is just a fragmentation of what I see in there. I figure that handouts are a way of life in this place. And they feel that their safety is just another handout. Many of them come from a tropical US owned territory. I asked them why they would leave such a warm beautiful place and the say for the jobs. Yet they mostly seem to pay with food stamps and State health cards. Some of the ones that work in the stores have the attitude of a never been married Liberian.

I think that the only answer is when a 3 decker home goes up for sale then the state should buy it and tear it down and not rebuild anything but a single family home. After many years the area will become family orientated and have some pride in their neighborhood. Since the slum lords will rent apartments to anyone.

[Bill Warnock]

Chucky, it can be a thankless job and it will remain that way until and unless the local community becomes involved and makes the determination not to live in constant fear, these problems will exist. Sometimes things have gone on for such a long period of time, there is little hope unless the attitude of the population changes for the better. It involves all of law enforcement, community leaders and the judicial system.
Enjoy the day,
Bill

[SecTrainer]

I think that the only answer is when a 3 decker home goes up for sale then the state should buy it and tear it down and not rebuild anything but a single family home. After many years the area will become family orientated and have some pride in their neighborhood. Since the slum lords will rent apartments to anyone.

Not a bad idea, Chucky. Or, instead of buying the property, the state could offer a financial incentive to whoever buys the property to put up a single-family dwelling, like offering low-cost financing. This would have the added benefit, perhaps, of turning some of the residents themselves into owners.

If the building is torn down, though, it does leave the question of where the other people in that building (who would be displaced) would live.

How about a modified version of your idea, which would be to leave the apartment building intact, but convert it into condos, This would make the residents owners instead of renters and maybe obtain the benefits of your original idea without the problem of displacement.

Would these condo owners not take greater pride in the property that they now own than they do now as renters? Perhaps the state could offer zero-interest, zero-down financing, or something like that - on the condition that the financing would be yanked if the property is not improved and maintained by the owners.

I do not know of any community in the condition you describe that has ever been "fixed" until the RESIDENTS of the community decide they've had enough. Enough of crime. Enough of filth. Enough of abandoned cars. Enough of drugs and guns being sold on the street. Enough of vacant buildings where bums hang out. Enough killing of their children. Police and security forces cannot solve problems that thrive on the indifference or inaction of the community. A community always gets exactly the kind of environment it tolerates.