I'm sick of living in a city I can't trust with my life.
Eight people have been murdered in this city since Wednesday.
And I'm sick of hearing that "the arrest 'was another example of the hard work and dedication' of the unit's detectives."
It's not enough. It's incomplete. The job description is serve and protect. Somebody, somewhere, has to have a better plan than "great reactions."
Whether it's a product of the long-running gentrification, the newly official economic downturn, bad parenting, violent video games, or whatever the eff you want to blame, people are killing each other in group homes, stabbing each other in the metro, breaking into homes wearing masks SWAT-style, conducting indiscriminately general "attacks on neighborhoods," shooting people near college campuses, killing people "a few dozen feet" from patrolling officers...
And now this, near the route I walk every day:
Chief Lanier, Mayor Fenty: your women and men in uniform have arguably the most difficult job on the planet, especially in a city where "administrative efficiency" is an oxymoron. But something has to give. You have a city that's falling apart. And I just don't think the murder of anyone I care about is the price we're supposed to pay for your services.
Go back to the drawing board. Have a scheme -- a preemptive, aggressive, scheme. Because as appreciative as we are that your people put their lives on the line for us, if it's not making any livable difference, you might as well just pull your people from harm's way.
5 comments:
Man...it's things like that that make me think twice about walking home alone. Northwest isn't quite the safe bubble it can sometimes seem...at least, compared to the rest of D.C.
I am not one to leap to defend the efficacy of DC Government. However, violent crime in the city is markedly down over the last 15 years; and this city is safer now than it has been since the early 80s. I am not trying to diminish the horrors of this most recent spate of grotesque violence, or your concerns about it. I am suggesting, however, that the MPD has performed laudably in its protection role. It's just very difficult to quantify crimes prevented.
The problem remains that no one is willing to address the real issues; homelessness, drug use, treating mental health issues with the same concern we give erectile dysfunction, education and living wages. Very few people turn to violent crime because they think it is fun; they do it because they feel they have no choice or because they are too out of their minds to distinguish right from wrong. Adding more police is like trying to kill a weed by pulling off the leaves, you have to get to the root.
liebchen: NW does still seem safer. it's just the seeming randomness seeping into the violence that really bothers me. i can avoid target areas. but i do need to get in and out of my house
refugee: this city is leaps and bounds past where it used to be. absolutely. and it is probably impossible to quantify prevention. i think i'd be more at ease, however, if there was a more public acknowledgment that right now, there's at least a short-term wave. and that should lead to more press conferences than we're getting. i don't feel like there's any upper management.
sara: that is without question the problem. and i think the recession is merely amplifying it all. more police probably won't work, especially if crimes are occurring in the presence of police. what i want more than anything is for someone to admit we have a problem. that cliche is always step 1 in any recovery effort
I can only imagine what it will be like after Jan 20ths...
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