Comments (0) It has been reported that a sharp increase in crime is the reason for the controversial discussions about possible security measures at Trinity College .
Statistics provided by the Hartford Police Department suggest a slight increase — rather than spike — in crime for the district this campus is in:
From August 7th through August 14th there will be a parking ban on the following streets between 8pm and 4am:
This information is courtesy of the Hartford Police Department.
UPDATED: August 8th: The Hartford Police Department has changed its mind about how to handle the increased traffic during West Indian Week Celebration and Parade. The information below is accurate, according to the HPD release, as of 8/8/11:
Kraus (left) and Roberts (right)
To frame anything in terms of war is to approach the situation with a failing strategy. We see this with actual wars, where the outcome is destruction, injury, rape, and death; the economy might get a temporary boost and the “winners” gain results through coercion. Look at the “War on Terrorism.” People and places are being destroyed, but is anything being done to address ideologies of terrorism? Has LBJ’s “War on Poverty” done anything to change the conditions in this country which create poverty? As with all the others, the “War on Drugs” resembles actual wars — lots of casualties, with only a handful of people experiencing real gains.
So, as leadership is stepping away from the decades’ old approach, why are decriminalization discussions still using the outmoded terminology? How we frame any issue is going to color our preconceived notions walking into a discussion; when I first saw the title of Friday morning’s community dialogue — “The Drug War: Is it time to change strategies?” — at the Mark Twain House and Museum, I had to wonder why this language was still being used, as a shift in strategies has already begun. A quick look at national policy shows a hierarchy of prevention, intervention, and recovery above incarceration. That’s on the federal level, though. Is any of this trickling down to local efforts to deal with a very real drug problem?
I’m not alone. During the question and response period of the Key Issues Forum, an audience member said that the “terminology is wrong,” citing the same examples as provided above. This man spoke about his experience growing up in a neighborhood where much of the drug trade sprang out of “middle class values with welfare money.” He said that selling drugs was not about being broke, but due to “self-esteem,” and wanting a certain type of lifestyle. If we talk about this in terms of war, then we would essentially need to declare war on the culture of conspicuous consumption which has become synonymous with “American lifestyle.” Anyone about to do that is going to get slapped with the label of “socialist.”
Another member of the audience spoke about her child’s addiction. This woman said she was from suburbia. Her child was raised by two parents and was taught to not use drugs, yet the adult child is recovering. How is some declaration of war going to look in this case? Are we going to fight middle class, suburban families?
The terminology is ludicrous.
Jack Cole
For 2011, as of publication, over $15 billion in federal and state dollars have been spent on the so-called drug war; in the past forty years, the expenditure has been over $1.5 trillion. As consumers, we expect something in return when we spend money. According to Jack Cole, a retired officer who spent much of his career undercover in narcotics, the national drug policy has purchased no positive results. Cole — on whom one of the main characters of Flipside is based – gave a presentation this morning in which he noted that the only statistic to remain the same before drugs were illegal, at the start of the “drug war,” and now, is that of addiction: 1.3% of the population. The percentage of those struggling with addiction may not have changed, but how addiction is being managed is not entirely positive. Mark Friedlander,M.D., Aetna’s Senior Medical Director, said that there is a divide in how people respond to substance abuse treatment; those over 25 have more success, where those under 25 do not respond as well to traditional treatments. Panelist Mark L. Kraus, M.D., described addiction as a “biopsychosocial disease” which is “progressive” and “in most cases will cause premature death.” Cole, of Law Enforcement Against Prohibition (LEAP), echoed this, saying that the organization wants “to treat this as a health problem.”
So, if locking up thousands of people every year has not done anything to reduce the amount of people whose lives are destroyed by addiction, what is there to do? Continue reading 'We’re Still Calling it a War?'»
If you’re female, you’ve no doubt received well-meaning advice to not walk alone (especially at night), perhaps not wear hair in a ponytail, and be careful, be careful, be careful. Such advice is utterly demeaning to women and removes all responsibility from those who commit the crimes. In Toronto, law students were given some equally disempowering and, dare I say it, misogynist advice from a police officer. Though he has since apologized, the officer informed the students that if they wished to not become victims, they should avoid dressing like “sluts.”
Besides that such a comment blames the victims instead of the assailants, it shows ignorance about the nature of rape. This crime is about “power, control, and anger.” It’s not about sex, even if that is used as a weapon. When a person of authority, such as a police officer, distributes such harmful information, it perpetuates the type of culture that makes crimes against women possible, the type in which rapists are rarely punished, and women spend their lives fearful of becoming (re)victimized. Furthermore, those who do become victims have less faith in the law enforcement agencies; if a crime is reported, will the police be supportive of the victim, or will they blame her?
In early April, approximately 3000-4000 people in Toronto marched to the police department in a procession called the SlutWalk. Its intention was to call out the member of the Toronto Police force for insensitivity and to demand accountability. Since then, a number of other SlutWalks have occurred and/or are planned. This has spread from various sites in Canada to cities in the United States, including Orlando, Dallas, Boston, Denver, Philadelphia, Seattle, Washington D.C., Chicago, and Hartford.
The Hartford SlutWalk will take place on May 1st and the march will go from Jennings Road to the State Capitol. People may choose to “dress like sluts,” whatever that entails, or not. The purpose of this is not to put on a fashion show; rather, it’s a show of unity. As the event organizer writes, “it is about whole communities standing up for what is right, and asserting that blaming victims for the pain, degradation, and dehumanization they have endured is intolerable.” It’s about reclaiming a term that is used to degrade women; females are frequently judged on their sexuality (real or perceived) when terms like slut, prude, whore, uptight, and ho are tossed around. Judging someone on such grounds is a way to objectify the person; it enables the rationalization of inequity, mistreatment, and worse.
If you’re wondering about how to best prevent rape, check out this factsheet.
UPDATED 4/28/11: Some of the details of the walk have changed. It will go from in front of the Wadsworth Atheneum to the State Capitol, instead of beginning at the police station on Jennings Road.
I watched with glee as the car of a local miscreant was towed away. During previous snowstorms, this person left his car parked on the street in spite of a citywide parking ban. As a result, plows could not effectively remove snow, narrowing the street so much that emergency vehicles could just barely make it through. Last night, police cruisers rolled down the street several times, stopping along the way to tell residents to move their vehicles into the public school lot located just around the corner. Most vehicle owners immediately heeded the order. Two cruisers parked side-by-side in the widest part of the street, waiting. A bit after the parking ban officially went into effect, a tow truck arrived and hauled away the car responsible for repeatedly narrowing the street. It’s the small things like this that bring a little joy into an otherwise monotonous and irritating season.
Today, Mayor Segarra issued a State of Emergency due to the record snowfall:
(January 27, 2011) — Mayor Pedro E. Segarra issued a State of Emergency today because of the record-shattering amount of snow that has fallen this month in Hartford.
“Storm after storm after storm has hit Hartford and we need State assistance in clearing away the snow and ice so that we can accommodate all the people who live, work, and visit Hartford. Urban areas like Hartford are densely populated and have less open space so there are limited options as to where to put these growing mounds of snow. Connecticut’s Capital City is the job center for the region and state and we must be able to keep pace with the demands that come with this responsibility, We are home to major hospitals and corporations so public safety and safe transportation are essential,” said Mayor Segarra.
Mayor Segarra signed the State of Emergency because of rapidly deteriorating conditions after this most recent storm, on top of the snow and ice accumulations from the storms of the past two weeks.
“The conditions of our streets must not put our residents and properties at risk,” said the Mayor.
The parking ban remains in effect until 8:00 p.m. Thursday, January 27th. If your car is ticketed and towed, information on its location may be obtained by calling the HPD Record’s Division at (860) 757-4150 between the hours of 8:00 a.m. to 6:30 p.m. Please have either the VIN (Vehicular Identification Number) or the license plate number available. You will be given the name of the company that towed your vehicle, their telephone number and your tow number. In order to avoid or minimize storage fees, please pick up your vehicle as soon as possible. Storage fees begin to accrue after 24 hours. The tow charge is $108.00.
The $99.00 snow emergency violation ticket is separate and payable to the Hartford Parking Authority.
Once again, Mayor Segarra urges property owners to shovel their walkways, sidewalks, driveways and curb-cuts and clear-away snow from fire hydrants. Continue reading 'Mayor Segarra Issues State of Emergency'»
The Gun Buyback Program has returned with a more fine-tuned message this year: the gun in your home might injure of kill a loved one; don’t let that happen. Last year’s message appeared to be that there were too many guns on the street and that anyone could catch a stray bullet. Undoubtedly that is true, but this different approach appeals more toward people whose weaponry collections exist for self-defense, target shooting, or hunting purposes, and not for criminal acts.
For more, see “$25 Gift Cards for Rifles and $75 for Handguns” on CT News Junkie.
Tonight twelve people spoke in favor of the Hartford Civil Rights ordinance at the public hearing in City Hall; none spoke against it. Several organizations on board with this proposed ordinance include the American Civil Liberties Union, Council on American-Islamic Relations (Connecticut), National Lawyers Guild, and Bill of Rights Defense Committee.
Although nobody spoke against this at the hearing, the ordinance received some dissent from those who felt it would weaken the Hartford Police Department’s ability to fight crime. Others spoke in opposition because they feared that homeland security would be threatened.
Shahid Buttar — Executive Director of the Bill of Rights Defense Committee — told the three City Councilors present that “no one’s trying to tie the hands of the police department.” The ordinance, in fact, had been revised to include language found more suitable by HPD Chief Darryl Roberts, who was present for the hearing. During the hearing and before, at the press conference and rally on the steps of City Hall, several people told stories of how they had experienced or witnessed profiling. Mongi Dhaouadi — Executive Director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations CT — described several occasions on which Muslims had been “arrested under false pretense,” which he said wastes resources; one such case was of a Muslim cited for loitering while he was waiting for a bus. Mary Sanders, a resident of the South End, described how a few months ago she awoke to the sound of the SWAT team smashing windows of her neighbor’s house. She said that a young, black male who lived there had been tasered and spent a few days in the hospital as a result. During the raid, the police found a single marijuana joint in the home. Another resident spoke of the racial disparities of prisoners serving time for drug offenses. He pointed out that there are plenty of Trinity College students using illegal substances, but that drug busts are not happening on the campus. A West End resident said that she learned of racial profiling occurring in her neighborhood.
The common thread through these and other stories shared was that racial, ethnic, and religious profiling occur here, and that it is not happening in just one section of the city. The message of the press conference was that this ordinance, if passed, would focus “police officers on their core public safety mission” and that it would help Police Chief Roberts to enforce the current state law against profiling, which supporters of this ordinance describe as being weak. Supporters insisted that the police would still be able to fight crime, but that they had to do so with “reasonable cause” on a “behavioral basis.”
Hector Robles has been fired from his job at the Hartford Police Department. The announcement of this comes one day before Election Day.
Nobody argued when David Panagore announced that “We are the epitome of the Eisenhower Interstate system.” Those with an interest in downtowns would be hard-pressed to justify any continuation of advocacy for the poor designs that have dissected cities, sucking the life force out of them. Today, we are given the task of recreating a vibrant downtown, which means addressing issues like walkability.
Hartford’s Chief Operating Officer, David Panagore, participated on Monday evening in a HYPE (Hartford Young Professionals and Entrepreneurs) sponsored discussion regarding the direction of development in downtown. The MetroHartford Alliance Conference Room on Pratt Street was filled, allowing for a fairly intimate conversation between about two dozen individuals who had some interest — they live, work, or recreate — in downtown.
Panagore explained how the “Six Pillars” were a fine goal to have at one point, but now, to complete the economic development, these pieces (Connecticut Convention Center, Capital Community College moving into former G.Fox building, etc.) must be connected. Continue reading 'Developing Connective Tissue in Downtown'»
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In the recent campaign for State Representative, word got out that Hector Robles — the current rep for the sixth district and an officer with the Hartford Police Department — was facing some serious accusations. It’s finally been revealed what he has been investigated for — double-billing and more.
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