THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Saturday, June 29, 1996 TAG: 9606280008
SECTION: FRONT PAGE: A10 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Editorial
LENGTH: 74 lines
Shocked and energized by 1995's record-high number of homicides (37) and fed up with drug-trafficking violence in their midst, Portsmouth residents and city officials, elected and appointed, met to brainstorm ways to bring law-and-order to city streets. Citizens also marched in the streets to demonstrate grass-roots unity against criminality.
That wasn't all. A federal task force that had targeted drug gangs in Portsmouth brought some notoriously murderous drug traffickers to justice. Portsmouth added police to its force in order to put more officers on night-patrol duty and beef up the homicide squad.
Change has come to other parts of the justice system. More murder suspects are being caught, and murder suspects who formerly might have been released pending trial are being kept behind bars. Their trials are being expedited.
The top-to-bottom community focus on crime is paying off. Portsmouth's overall crime rate in the first five months of 1996 is more than 9 percent below the comparable 1995 period. Police Chief Dennis Mook reported earlier this month that citizen cooperation with police is way up.
That's the happiest of developments. Most people want to live in peace and security. But they can't live that way if they don't unite against criminals. This really is an instance in which people will surely be victimized separately if they don't stick together.
So they must not be unresponsive to comparatively harmless accidental, careless or criminal acts that degrade neighborhoods.
Broken windows must be repaired must be repaired - fast.
Abandoned cars must be whisked from the streets before people start stripping them.
Graffiti must be eradicated promptly from walls and other public surfaces, and perpetrators of graffiti must be penalized, also promptly.
Vacant houses must be boarded up and, if possible, quickly made habitable and reoccupied or torn down.
Overgrown vacant lots must be cleared.
Continuing neighborhood paint-up, fix-up, clean-up efforts stop blight and tell criminals to move on, that the people of the neighborhood take pride in their community and are protective of their turf. Neighbors' reports to police about nearby drug dealing and other lawbreaking activities enhance safety and restore good order.
Since tranquil neighborhoods are desirable, most people must work together to keep criminals at bay. Criminality thrives amid community disarray, accelerating neighborhoods' decline.
Every municipality and its citizens should mobilize resources to spare any neighborhood Portsmouth River Edge Apartments' fate. The development deteriorated over the years from a decent habitat for shipyard workers and their families to a hellish setting for an open-air drug bazaar.
Portsmouth designated the apartments for bulldozing and replacement with single-family housing for middle-income families. That was the only sensible option for the city, so far gone was River Edge Apartments.
The last residents having decamped from that collapsed neighborhood, Portsmouth City Council Tuesday approved a $1.75 million expenditure to prepare the site for new housing. Within months, River Edge Apartments will soon be history.
That's a happy prospect. The apartments had become a cancer.
If we have learned anything about how to keep cities from going down the tubes, it is that municipalities' top priority must be to prevent rot. Municipal governments in league with their residents and businesses must strive to, at the very least:
Make safe all streets and neighborhoods.
Deal promptly and forcefully with crimes.
Ensure that public schools are safe, effective learning centers.
Provide wholesome recreational opportunities for children.
Demand and enforce tidiness and maintain order.
Enforce city property and zoning codes.
Restore or demolish abandoned houses and clear vacant lots.
Encourage and seek out economic development.
Focusing on such things build a sense of community - or common purpose - that promote and characterize healthy cities. It's not rocket science, just common sense, and doable. by CNB