Report - Forum on Violence - no mention of domestic violence

Panelists:  Mayor Duffy, Rev Marlow Washington, DA Mike Green, Dep County Exec Jim Smith, Chief of Police Moore, and Superintendent Brizard. Editorial Board, host of the event, was introduced:  Michael Kane, Karen Magnuson and Jim Lawrence.  Special recognition to the photographer who memorialized the victims of violence on display at the Dryden Theater.  (I'm sorry I can't recall the photographer's name.  The Dryden Theater website doesn't seem to have references to this display.)

Mr. Lawrence did not start the panel with opening remarks from each of the panelists, as would be expected.  He launched into a question tailored to each of the panelists, some variation of the question, "what will you do differently?"

In each case, the question was more or less rebuffed.  No one wanted to come out and say, if we knew what we could do differently, we'd already be doing it, but Mayor Duffy came as close as anyone, by saying, "we will do what we can, and report back to the community how effective those efforts were."

 

Jim Smith, representing the County Executive, tried to say that it isn't a city problem, it's the whole community's problem, including the county.  But that point was difficult to sustain in light of other points made about the concentrations of poverty, especially within "the crescent".  Some panelists recognized that there are pockets of great wealth in the county, but poverty is not equally distributed.  That affects behavior within those neighborhoods, and that in turn affects the children and the schools.  None of the panelists actually pointed to the zoning ordinances in the suburbs that prevent low income housing, but that certainly came to my mind as the Deputy County Executive tried to play the sympathetic collaborator.

Mr. Brizard did very well fielding a question about violence in our schools.  The specific question pointed out the large number of fights that broke out last week alone at East High.  Mr. Brizard demonstrated that he is reviewing what happens in each school, from top to bottom, from before the students and teachers arrive until after the school day is done.  He stated that the entire climate of the school contributes to violence or lack of violence:  the degree to which students are involved in each class, to whether each student has an adult to turn to when they need help.  His remarks were received with applause.

Rev. Washington spoke briefly about a community initiative called "You bet I told!"  It involves billboards to counteract the "no snitching" mentality, and he described the differences.  Snitchers are fellow offenders who get caught and find that they need to "cut a deal" by telling on their partners in crime. "You bet I told!" is aimed at the members of the community that know the criminals, perhaps are even related, to change the culture of the bystanders.  It remains to be seen what impact this will have.

Mr. Lawrence asked DA Green whether enough resources were available for witness protection.  Mr. Green said he has never been turned down for a request for financial aid when witness protection was called for, so he didn't see an issue there.  Chief Moore basically said that there are no quick fixes; just continuous police presence and police tactics.

No one on the panel spoke to the Zero Tolerance program by name.  No one spoke to issues of domestic violence.