Thursday, May 27, 2010

Calls for National Guard to Help Flint

Vera Rison and Brenda Clack asked for help from the National Guard to combat Flint's soaring crime rate. Instead, Gov. Jennifer Granholm authorized an increased state police presence in the city.

Kristen Longley of The Flint Journal reports:
The governor has authorized the Michigan State Police to triple its presence in Flint after the city has seen five homicides in six days, including a fatal shooting this morning.

Mayor Dayne Walling made the call for help yesterday to Gov. Jennifer Granholm's office, and she responded:

"Public safety is our top priority, and we stand ready to assist our local partners to ensure that citizens are protected and remain safe," Granholm said in a statement released at a City Hall news conference this morning.


12 comments:

  1. Headlines in Today's Flint Journal. "National Guard not coming to Flint." Across the page, "Crackdown on basketball hoops in the streets" Amazing there is not enough manpower to curb murders, yet there is a task force to confiscate basketball hoops in the neighborhoods where the city no longer spends anything on park upkeep.

    I understand that some gang members use the basketball hoop in the street as a cover for nefarious actions, but come on...confiscate all the hoops in the street?

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  2. no skateboarding. no basketball. what's there left to do?

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  3. Well, there's always sex. And dreams of escape.

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  4. Aren't those the aspirations of Catholic school students, Sable?

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  5. Flint is a hell hole plan in simple, they are asking for help and the governer isn't allowing it to happen.

    P.S. I posted as anonymous but I USED to stay in flint glad I made it out.

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  6. Decades of entitlement and a poor education system have led to the downfall of Flint. Give a man a fish he can eat but he will be back for more fish day after day but teach a man to fish and he can eat everyday on his own. In Flint, there is no more fish for free and no one knows how to catch fish.

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  7. There are no fish in the pond left to fish.

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  8. The interesting thing is that homicide is the one crime that an increased police presence will have little effect in preventing. Yet, because it is the ultimate crime, it is the one used for justification for more police. For example, Flint's worst homicide numbers have occurred in years when the police force was up to full strength. Go figure. Whatever works, I guess.

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  9. I was thinking the same thing. If you look at these murders, it's unlikely more cops cruising the streets would prevent them, unless there were a lot more cops. But it seems like other crimes, like house break-ins, would be reduced. And as many readers have pointed out, more police on the street would help combat the sense that Flint is out of control.

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  10. These condidions are present in many of the older cities here. Newark, Gary, and Cleveland and many others, not to mention Detroit, are examples.

    Some recent articles here mentioned Medical facilities as rejuvenating certain towns. However, with Health Care reform, the only persons who will bail these facilities out are well heeled foreign nationals, and they will need a whole lot more of them to make up for the national shortfall.

    I think the biggest part of our problems is outsourcing, done to "buy peace" with other nations. And this boneheaded plan could not have happened without federal policies made by people who think they have nothing worry about, and don't think about the people who suffer from their policies.

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  11. "Wilting Cities" are not just a Flint, Michigan, or United States problem.

    Apparently, European cities aren't growing fast either, and that's looking at Metropolitan Areas. Central Cities would probably make the problem look worse that this article shows.

    http://www.investors.com/NewsAndAnalysis/Article/535934/201006011818/Europes-Other-Problem-Wilting-Cities-That-Raise-The-Odds-Against-Recovery.aspx

    And I think you would find that urban blight is a worldwide problem. Olympic television coverage tends to cut out blight.

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  12. Example: Vancouver, BC, Canada. Murder rate and blight on the increase. Amsterdam,London, pick a big or a small one. The current economic/drug/moral mentality doesn't lend for acceptable life style among even the rich or poor. As they used to say when I was growing up, "These kids aint got no fetchen up....world wide. Not many places have this ill aspect of existence under control. Maybe, Singapore.

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Thanks for commenting. I moderate comments, so it may take a while for your comment to appear. You might enjoy my book about Flint called "Teardown: Memoir of a Vanishing City," a Michigan Notable Book for 2014 and a finalist for the 33rd Annual Northern California Book Award for Creative NonFiction. Filmmaker Michael Moore described Teardown as "a brilliant chronicle of the Mad Maxization of a once-great American city." More information about Teardown is available at www.teardownbook.com.