THIS IS SCARY, ME AND EDDIE PEREZ ON THE SAME PAGE

I have to ask if Hartford's Mayor Luke Bronin reads the paper or watches the television news. If he did I would have thought he would have realized there has been a huge surge in gun violence the last few weeks. Instead, Bronin held a press conference recently acknowledging the  violence. ( since I originally started this posting a couple weeks ago, at least three more people have been killed and numerous victim's shot)

Who is advising Eddie Perez? His former Chief of Staff? (Pictured above)

Now I will have to give Bronin a little bit of a break , he is in a tight re-election campaign and he does need to spend the majority of his time on the phone fundraising to hit the $1million dollar mark to once again buy the Mayor's Office. Maybe he could maybe spend a little more time performing the job the people of Hartford thought he was going to do.

I found this on the "Eddie Perez for Hartford" website;

Former Hartford Mayor Eddie Perez is calling on Luke Bronin to stay in Hartford and work to stem the outbreak of shooting violence in Hartford instead of traveling out of state to collect thousands of dollars in campaign donations from wealthy donors. 

In mid-June, as the number of shooting victims increased, Bronin decided his priority was to leave Hartford to attend a Washington D.C. fundraiser where he collected thousands of dollars from lobbyists and Washington insiders^[1].

As the number of shooting victims and deaths continued to rise^[2], Bronin jetted to a Beverly Hills Mansion^[3] to party with donors who gave him thousands more in campaign donations. That very day, four more people were shot in North Hartford^[4].

“Luke Bronin has shown time after time that he is more focused on the needs of his wealthy campaign donors than the people of Hartford. This Hartford gun violence crisis has been growing for over a month, but little has been heard from Bronin because he has focused his time on raising huge sums of campaign cash outside of Hartford for future runs for office. It is time for Luke Bronin to put the people of Hartford first and put his fundraising travel on hold.  It is time he got serious about working with our communities to stem this outbreak of violence.” Perez stated

Those are interesting comments from Perez ,

because as a former Gang Member, he might  possibly have been responsible for his own  share of gun violence in years past, but as much as I hate to admit , he is right in his assessment of Bronin
Up to this point we have not received our money's worth from Bronin. He spent his first 18 months orchestrating his failed run for Governor and now he is preoccupied trying to keep his job from being taken away by a convicted felon and a handful of true Community people ( By Community people, I mean people that have made names for themselves in the community and not just constructing the next rung on their political ambition ladders)

When I originally started this posting, we were at homicide number 15, I saved it as a draft and decided to work on it again today, so it has not gotten better,

Yesterday, the start of West Indian Celebration week, there was a huge shootout in the Northend of Hartford from Windsor Street up to North Main. Police Officers that viewed the HPD C4 surveillance video said it  was amazing no one was killed, either by gunfire or innocent pedestrians the way cars were driving on the sidewalks shooting at each other..

I don't think Luke Bronin gets it. Probably because he feels safe in his own home with C4  Police cameras aimed at the front of his home protecting , mounted by Bushnell Park ( Coincidentally paid for by the taxpayers of Hartford, I seriously doubt any other Hartford resident or business has the same luxury of that surveillance) and the C4 cameras aimed at his back door and parking area from Clinton Street. No one else on Mather Street or Shultas Place  or anywhere else in the City is protected the way the Mayor has protected himself and his family from crime.

Now I know Luke hasn't been here too many years to understand what us long term residents know, but this violence occurs every summer and halfway through the summer is not the time to start planning for it. What steps were set up over the winter to plan initiatives?

Why did it take 15 homicides for Luke to wake up? Why is he just now calling for a dedicated Gun Prosecutor? We had one under Chief Rovella's Shooting Task Force model, and by most accounts Prosecutor Dave Zagaja did an outstanding job following cases through to the end and helped in getting gun play off our streets.

Connecticut State Troopers were embedded  with the Shooting Task Force along with East Hartford, West Hartford, Manchester Windsor, Wethersfield and police Officers from other agencies . Federal agencies and State Probation and Parole Officer's as well. They were all tools in  now Commissioner Rovellas toolbopx when he was given the orders  by Governor Malloy and Chief States Attorney Kevin Kane to "do something about the violence in Hartford" It is time to dust off Jim Rovella's master plan and recreate STF or something similar. Although STF wasn't popular with politicians at City Hall because of the mental image it created.

Rather, I think Bronin needs to look at the results it produced and also the results you can't quantify, how much gun violence was prevented by their efforts and work behind the scenes that didn't result in arrests, but prevented shootings.

I think  it is irresponsible to leave an "Interim" Chief in that position during such periods of violence. An Interim Chief is basically a lameduck Chief  unwilling to make major changes while walking on eggshells with the Administration if they are applying for the permanent job ( I also am not sure if there has even been an application process since Chief Rosado resigned)

A national search would also set HPD back in finding candidates and then the learning curve if they were hired to figure out HPD and the City. Remember Eddie Perez's experiment, Patrick Hartnett from NYPD.

Jason Thody may not be the perfect choice but he is the best choice for the sudden exit of David Roasdo. I think Bronin either doesn't realize  who he has or hasn't worked enough with Deputy Chief William Long. Long is well versed in the inner workings of HPD and is already responsible of many of  the Administrative functions at HPD and the day to day functions from everything fro, vehicles to overtime accountability. Long would also be , in addition to Thody,  a great choice for permanent Chief. ( if this is considered an endorsement by me, it will probably be the kiss of death because Bronin , I am sure doesn't appreciate my opinion)

Even thought the powers to be and Council members didn't like the image of the Shooting Task Force, the image of bodies dropping in the streets on an almost daily basis from shootings and homicides isn't much better.

Luke forget the fundraising and the out of state trips. I think a million dollars in your coffers already is enough to beat your competition and actually doing the job you were elected to do may prove priceless as far as the voters are concerned.