In recent months, public officials rushed to the microphone to take credit when the crime rate dropped. Will they now rush back to the microphone and take blame when the crime rate rises?
If a limited deployment is ordered, there are ways to do this right, Arthur Hunter writes. Guard personnel could assume tasks to increase public safety by putting more officers on streets, and improve our infrastructure by attacking the places that invite crime.
“We have much work to do,” Hunter writes, “to ensure that an anti-terrorist component is part of the planning process for every special event that attracts thousands – Mardi Gras, festivals and holiday celebrations, even our Sunday second-line parades.”
A group of talented young African American men had little hope that the city could help them - until they learned the ways that the city could change.
How New Orleans can generate revenue and support small businesses through a city-owned centralized payment-processing system
If we bring the right people to the table and think outside the box, we can reduce insurance rates, bring down heat levels within our city, put our youth to work, have strong roofs, dry streets, cooler neighborhoods and be a national leader in climate adaptation.
As the jail population climbs toward its maximum capacity – 1,250 – as set by the City Council, it’s clear that we must take a close look at what happens inside the Criminal District Courthouse.
Among other things, look for a skilled manager, an innovator, who can, despite low manpower, devise strategies to fight crime and move the department away from its long-standing culture of favoritism.
