THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Thursday, February 9, 1995 TAG: 9502070126
SECTION: NORFOLK COMPASS PAGE: 06 EDITION: FINAL
COLUMN: IN THE NEIGHBORHOODS
SOURCE: MIKE KNEPLER
LENGTH: Medium: 72 lines
While politicians try to outflank each other with rhetoric about slashing taxes and cutting government, retired police chief Henry Henson manuveurs through the murky middle ground.
He's finding that some Norfolk residents may not be all that opposed to higher taxes for services, especially police.
Henson is the main spokesman for a proposal from the Norfolk Neighborhood Crime Prevention Coalition to add 306 police to the current 687-member force.
Although reported crime seems to be dropping, more police are needed, Henson says, to make all of Norfolk equally safe.
Henson warns police are overworked doing normal patrols and investigations while also meeting more often with citizens. He cautions, too, that crime often is pushed from neighborhood to neighborhood instead of erased.
The coalition, Henson says, suggests that added police could be deployed as follows: 162 for patroling, 59 for community policing, 56 for overlap shifts, 10 for narcotics, 4 for the youth gang unit, 5 for detectives and 10 to help citizen patrols.
Of course, the ``big pitfall,'' as Henson says, is funding, at least $9.9 million a year.
Henson wants more discussion on tough choices: Do you want 306 more police? What level of crime is ``tolerable''? What are the trade offs? What services are you willing to shift money from?
``People just need to know where we all stand in the overall picture,'' he said. ``It lets people stop and think about the situation, talk about how to overcome it and decide whether to utilize the resources.''
Recently, Henson ``brainstormed'' with the Ballentine Place and East Ocean View civic leagues. Here's a synopsis of some ideas:
Devising a payroll tax to spread costs to commuters who work in Norfolk.
Getting the state to raise the sales tax to 5 percent, from 4.5 percent, and earmark added revenues for local law enforcement.
Creating a local lottery.
Hiking Norfolk's $1.38 real-estate tax rate by 14 cents. That's $112 a year more - $9.33 a month - on an $80,000 house.
Henson calls the real-estate tax hike ``the worst case scenario.'' But it may be the only alternative unless there are drastic changes in state law.
Another option? Some citizens say they're not afraid to examine their behavior and values.
``If I had a choice of turning my cable TV off or paying for more cops, I'd pay the cops,'' said Karen Wymer of East Ocean View. ``If I did away with my hairspray and it gave me more safe streets, I'd do it in a heartbeat.''
But most won't make such sacrifices, Wymer said, because they don't see connections with helping their neighborhoods.
``You don't think about that money going to a police officer helping a community. You think of the IRS and the big guys downtown, and that we'll never see that money in our community,'' she said. ``It's a big thing to find something where I feel that I'm contributing to my community.''
Besides adding police, the coalition proposes:
A night court for adjudicating more cases and relieving nightshift police from sitting in court all day.
A 200-bed facility for nonviolent work-release prisoners.
Laws to hold juveniles and parents more accountable for crimes by youngsters. Henson wants to look at lowering the age of adulthood to 16 and giving parents more leeway for spanking without facing charges of child abuse. MEMO: To invite Henry Henson to your civic league, write the Norfolk
Neighborhood Crime Prevention Coalition, P.O. Box 14465, Norfolk, Va.
23518.
by CNB