More gunplay in broad daylight in NE Portland
This afternoon it was at 18th and Dekum. Friday afternoon it was at 7th and Broadway, where the new streetcar tracks are.
No one was hit in either incident, and so the average Portlander will ignore these incidents. At some point -- a very tragic point -- that will change.
| Posted at 10:06 PM | Permalink |
|
Comments (15)
So, what would you see as a remedy for this? A cop on every corner? And would that even work?
Posted by Isaak | August 14, 2011 10:26 PM
A cop on every corner?
Well, if the city wasn't electing to put a streetcar on every corner there might be a lot more money available for more/better cops to keep the peace. PPD has had their budget slashed every year for the last decade. There probably wasn't a cop on every corner before that, but when you consistently defund your police dept. you tend to get increased crime.
Posted by Ryan | August 14, 2011 10:43 PM
Thank god there are Parking Meters!
Posted by dman | August 14, 2011 10:51 PM
Yes, even on Sunday afternoons. Gotta pay for Ellis McCoy's management coach.
Posted by Jack Bog | August 14, 2011 11:12 PM
Up at 15th and Mason, a mere pair of stabbings: http://tinyurl.com/3mococc
Posted by Jack Bog | August 14, 2011 11:50 PM
And yet, for most of that decade of PPB defunding, the reported crime stats show decreases in every crime category.
Measure 11 carted a lot of bad guys off the streets, New generation has now come on, and they don't yet have the message. And some of the wave of first generation of Measure 11 folks have completed their sentences and are on their back to the streets from prison.
Posted by Nonny Mouse | August 15, 2011 1:59 AM
Budget "slashed every year for the past decade."? Think again; the PPD budget has actually INCREASED every year based on it's "Statistical Review." The budget was $132k in 2006, $141k in 2007, $141k in 2008, $153k in 2009 and $162k in 2010. Sworn officers increased from 953 in 1993 to 977 in 2010. Seems like we are paying more and getting less.
Posted by Bankerman | August 15, 2011 7:18 AM
Having spent some time volunteering with convicts in a halfway house (long ago), I can tell you that sentencing is not likely to fix much of anything. Keeping people out of the system in the first place is the real solution, Nonnysense aside.
And what keeping people out of the system might look like is parents with living wages, schools that offered educations that would lead to meaningful employment, public universities and CCs that provided educations that resulted in work skills, not seeing corruption in public life and believing that if it's OK for the pols, it's OK for the prols. It might mean not believing the PoPo are gangstas on the other side (of course while the PoPo have free range to kill people with no consequences, that won't stop). It might mean transit service that helped those who need it most and not trains for hipsters and condo bunker developer weasels.
It might mean real HOPE not what Obama has delivered.
Posted by LucsAdvo | August 15, 2011 7:19 AM
...corruption in public life and believing that if it's OK for the pols, it's OK for the prols...
When there is no respect for the constitution, no respect or care for the people and public interests, the scene has been set. The people don't count and the kids know it.
On the local level, we know what a shabby citizen process we have. The leaders of our community have not been stellar leaders, young people can see that it was OK for our Mayor to take an envelope of cash to the desk clerk for someone, hypocrisy reigns here, the list is long.
Posted by clinamen | August 15, 2011 7:58 AM
Whatever it is, it's not because of the proliferation and easy availability of guns. America's penchant for gun crime never has anything to do with its love of guns....move along here, nothing to see.
Posted by observer | August 15, 2011 8:12 AM
Guns do not cause crime. People do. If there weren't guns, there'd be other weapons to use.
Posted by LucsAdvo | August 15, 2011 9:05 AM
"If there weren't guns, there'd be other weapons to use."
Sales Of Baseball Bats, Billy Clubs Up 5,000 Percent On UK Amazon.com: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/08/09/baseball-bat-billy-club-sales-uk-amazon_n_922217.html
Posted by Molly | August 15, 2011 9:19 AM
Clinamen and LucsAdvo are dead on. Elitism, arrogance, and graft in local politics have sent a clear message to the disadvantaged and set the stage for Portland to be the next London. And anyone who thinks that guns are the reason people get killed only need to look in the overflowing prisons where they're not even allowed.
Posted by Mr. Grumpy | August 15, 2011 9:26 AM
Molly's right...if not guns, we'd have mass baseball bat clubbings at shopping malls and bystanders hit by drive-by-knifings.
Who said people "only" get killed by guns?
Bring up guns and set your watch for the strawman to come-a-knockin'.
Posted by observer | August 15, 2011 10:15 AM
Don't those punks know the Dekum Triangle/Woodlawn area is an up-and-coming urban hotspot? Hipsters do not like bullets with their artisan pizza.
Posted by Eric | August 15, 2011 12:25 PM