I am fed up with police resources being stripped from my neighborhood, and other neighborhoods in the City to cover problem bars. I am fed up with the police coverage that is supposed to be assigned to my area being stripped to fill holes in other areas of the City.
Am I , as well as my neighbors, any less entitled to proper police coverage because other areas of the City don't know how to act properly.
Asylum Hill, my neighborhood, is pretty much a relatively quiet area crime wise. It does not happen just because of luck or good geographic's. It happens because we have the Asylum Hill walk beat as well as some good supervision in the area. The two Central District Lieutenants operate out of an office a half block away from me. They are accessible and approachable, not just for me but members of the community as well.
The major portion of the stability though is the tone set by the walk beat officer, who is actually on a bike. Loiterers know not to hang on the corners, Hartford High students know better than to loiter on Farmington Avenue when they are skipping class. And people going to the cell phone store to fence stolen items have learned that an officer on the bike is following their activity.
It is called quality of life enforcement, the things that destroy neighborhoods
My walk beat has not been on his walk beat all week. Monday he was pulled to fill a vacant cruiser, Car 30. Tuesday he was pulled to guard a prisoner at Hartford Hospital. Today he was pulled to fill in at Tele-serve, the front desk at HPD.
And trust me , the word spreads quick when he is not here, you can notice the difference. Should me and my neighbors have to deal with the instability caused because the City Councils commitment to us as residents seems not to be there. Lets start not filling the west end cruisers around the Council members home and see what the response is.
My walk beat officer also covers one of the City's latest hell holes of crime, South Marshall Street, home to one of our latest homicide victims who was stuffed in a bag and dumped in Suffield, numerous gun arrests including a sawed off shotgun, and a real hotbed for drug dealing.
Now I am being told our "Condition Units", which were sold to the neighborhoods as teams of Officers that would be focused on quality of life issues, are being permanently assigned to the Central Bar district every Thursday, Friday Saturday and Sunday night now. The North District Conditions Units are being assigned to North Main Street bars and clubs every Thursday Friday Saturday and Sunday now also.
I guess that means that quality of life issues in the rest of the neighborhoods are only important one day a week.
It is wrong, the nuisances and problem locations need to be forced to be a part of the solution, instead of draining resources from the rest of the City. Many areas, such as my neighborhood have worked hard to reduce crime and build relationships with our officers to have safe streets. To risk that by shuffling them around is wrong
And while I am at it, I am usually very supportive of our Police Officers. I am growing increasingly troubled by those officers that are more focused on the "PJ's" or private duty jobs. There are numerous officers in competition to see who will hit $150,000 first for the year rather than focusing on their primary commitment to Public Safety in Hartford.
I want to know that Officer's are focused on their job 100% when they are in my neighborhood. I want to know that Officers are paying attention and not missing dead bodies shot in some one's yard because they are too lazy to get out of their car on a shooting call because they have already worked 5 or 6 PJ's for the week already.
I am not sure anyone could give their full effort to any employer after standing in the sun and 90 degree temperatures several days a week at a road ,job, and the Linnmore Street homicide and not seeing a dead body laying in a side yard is the perfect example.
Start the comments rolling, but there is no way to defend any of this other than to properly staff and fund the PD. Hartford will never turn around with headlines like we have seen this week.