Comments on Letter of the Day

Once there are enough luxury condos, there will be enough police protection...

@1 - but they won't actually address the problem; they'll just move it more towards Belltown.

This still doesn't beat my experience in Vancouver's East End - at 2:30 pm, bright daylight, a junkie shooting up, supporting himself against the window of a corner market (open for business) when a police cruiser drives by, looks at the guy, and keeps going! Across the street, were 3 people passing around baggies and money; again, the police cruiser just passed by. I just hurried along my way to Chinatown...

"i just don't know how we could possibly solve this situation" - the SPD.

the honest sincerity of this letter breaks my heart.

I was empathizing with her until I got to "I (...) feel very sorry for the unsuspecting people paying millions for the luxury condos currently under construction across the street!" For goodness sakes, that's when you smirk evilly and laugh.

This is sad. I have lived less than a block from where this took place for about 7 years. The gang/junkies come in surges. It gets better then worse. The shooting at 2nd and Pine last week was an eye opener for me. I'll just steer clear of that whole area after dark. Hell, en daylight it doesn't seem that much safer.

This is sad. I have lived less than a block from where this took place for about 7 years. The gang/junkies come in surges. It gets better then worse. The shooting at 2nd and Pine last week was an eye opener for me. I'll just steer clear of that whole area after dark. Hell, en daylight it doesn't seem that much safer.

While I'm sure few "P3" gangbangers read The Slog, you shouldn't have printed this person's full name. Too easy to stalk.

I'm reminded of one of Dina Martina's jokes from a few years back. "While I'm in Seetle I am running the marathon. But I'm starting from Second and Pike, because I think that's a very good place to run from."

And I love how the one guy the SPD went after was a blakc guy in a wheelchair... AND THEY FRAMED HIM!

Maybe the SPD sells drugs to those junkies and that's what they don't do anything about it. Who knows these days.

And I love how the one guy the SPD went after was a black guy in a wheelchair... AND THEY FRAMED HIM!

Maybe the SPD sells drugs to those junkies and that's what they don't do anything about it. Who knows these days.

This is a problem all over Seattle. Police don't want to risk their lives in the really bad neighborhoods, probably in part because they know they have shit for backup. I suspect we need more cops.
The better solution would be legalizing drugs and banning guns completely in this country, but you know that shit ain't ever gonna happen. So more cops. I know weed was de-prioritized as a law enforcement concern, but I never saw the ruling where crack and heroin were... Bust these fuckers. So what if they're back on the street in two months? That's two months of slightly reduced danger to human life.

I work a block away, and this is spot on. I joke that I should be an undercover cop because I could bust people right and left just walking to lunch - that's broad daylight. And also spot on is the observation that you never see cops anywhere near.

When I was working at Pine and Summit and we were trying to displace the crack dealers that had taken up residence there, the police actually told me not to call in about it. The ONE time they picked a guy up while I was there he was back on the street by the time I closed the bar. More often, when I'd call, the response time was very slow, and they'd just kind of drive by slowly...

there was a blog about a year ago where a guy had a really gross alley on capitol hill and the police didn't seem to care. so he started snapping pics out his window of all the nefarious actions and posting them on his blog, for all the world to see. the blog is now gone-maybe the alley got cleaned up, but this seems like a good idea to me.

I live just a few blocks from there. The noise and the druggies don't bother me at all. The gang kids however, give the neighborhood an air of intimidation that really bothers me. I've lived in some pretty cracked out neighborhoods in SF and NYC that felt safer than 2nd and Pike feels at night. That's what happens when the gangster-gangster wannabes are allowed to run around harrasing people in the neighborhood without being restrained by the cops.

I lived in that same building for 4 years 1994 to 1998 and same things happened then as described in the letter. My apt was on the front corner of the building so bedroom window was on the alley side and living room window faced Pine. I didn't have the parking lot view. I had quite the view of the gang fights at the bus stop, the hookers doing business in the alley and back then it was the Art Bar around the corner making noise til all hours. Non stop sirens night and day. I left for work at 4:45 AM and took a big gulp to brace myself every morning headed out the lobby door. I had about a 5 block walk to work and along the way I looked around in every direction and was always half prepared to start running. I'd encounter all kinds of crap from a couple guys busting the windows out at the jewlery store to bums trying to get money from me. I'd offer gum to the bums and I'd haul ass when the guys were busting windows. Living d'town should be better but just isn't all that great. I think I called the cops once when a fight broke out in front of the building but quickly learned that was a total waste of time.

@ 14 and 15:
Buy bust operations, as they're called, only exacerbate the problem and don't actually make the open-air drug markets go away. It's a known place to buy drugs, and so if a couple runners or dealers are busted, there's another crackhead who could use the work standing right there. That particular dealer or runner would be jail for a few months/years, and then would be unemployable due to the felony conviction. They end up back on the street selling crack since there's no other job for them.
See the WSJ article on falling coke prices:
http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v07/n690/a05.html?64762

Instead, offer a shitload of social services, job training, etc.
I'd love for the SPD to actually focus on violent crime, which is pretty fucking bad in this city IMO, than on the relatively non-violent crack runners and whores.

I just love that a new luxury condo building is going up in the midst of crack central. I wonder if the concierge will run errands to the needle exchange right next door?

20. Even that doesn't work, for another reason:

Of all the people in the world to accurately explain why crack dealers deal crack, Snoop Doggy Dogg put it best: when he was bagging groceries at the supermarket, he was making $5 an hour. When he started selling crack, he was making $500 a night. The money in working legit just doesn't compare to the money in selling drugs.

21. The SPD will do what they always do: they let the crime problem get bad in a place where new condos are getting built. Once the condos are up and ready to go, they finally get to work and sweep the problem out.

Years later, the Mayor gets out crime statistics and show that crime drops in areas where they build condos (hee, how did that happen), and use it as evidence that gentrification works.

Ari @17 I bookmarked it...still there:

http://seattlealleywatch.blogspot.com/

BTW i see this guy every day, walking funny, around 23rd and Union.

@23:

The only problem I can think of with that theory, is that, at this location at least, the gentrification idea was tried once before when they put up the condos on the SW corner of 2nd & Pike (the ones that had the movie theatre for a few years, before they went out of business), and it failed miserably then.

I just can't imagine doing the same thing over again is going to change the atmosphere down there, unless SPD moves in with a permanent presence, which they most likely won't.

i remember catching a movie there. i was wondering what ever happened to that cinema.

Does everybody here realize SPD is taking scholarly do-gooder abuse for too MUCH drug crime enforcement at 2nd&Pine and pionts adjacent (leading to racial disparities in drug delivery arrests)?

OK, not everybody.

Anybody?

i also miss the broadway market theatre. just so you know.

@27 RonK:

it is not unreasonable to ask for FAIR law enforcement. we don't have to choose between NO law inforcement and UNJUST law enforcement. i'd go as far as to say UNJUST is worse than NO.

just having a couple of cops there not framing people would go a long way towards making people who live there feel safer there.

I dont think this is anything new for 2nd and pike. I remember being 12 years old and drunken druggies trying to grab my boobs (awesome!) and then I remember numerous times changing buses to get to ballard at 9pm and it being the scariest block in the world. I also remember seeing my first live prostitute there when I was a kid. I just dont see why anyone would ever, EVER want to live there.

These shootings and fights downtown are ridiculous. Who is keeping these drug dealers in business and why would the gangs even want to be in this area? It seems obvious to everybody who the culprits are so why aren't we doing anything about it? If you live downtown isn't it your job to keep it surveyed? The police can only go off what they hear and if people want their neighborhoods cleaned up, they have to be the ones doing the calls and making their area unwelcoming to gangs. Call the police. Call your city council members. Call together a vast number of downtown residents to stand on the corner where you know drug deals are going to go down all night and psych out the gang members. If you want the streets take them.

@23, i think the issue is more availability of drug work vs. availability of legal work. for most runners, the drug business isn't particularly lucrative. it's once you move up the chain that you find the people actually making money. but they're very rarely the ones getting busted.

everyone should know that buy-bust operations always result in racially disparate results, without any notable gain in public safety. google the work of uw sociologist katherine beckett and read her stuff.

When I lived in Belltown many years ago, it was common knowledge not to go on 2nd or 3rd ave at all once the sun went down. I lived on 5th, so it was fairly easy to avoid those crack areas. I can't imagine living there. *shivers*

look bitch, you live downtown in a major city. deal with it or move out to Redmond with the rest of the rich white folks.

25. Well, of course the problem returns. You sweep it out long enough to sell the units, and then once they're sold, you unlock the gates and let the trash back in.

32. The avilability certainly brings the drug dealers back to drug dealing, but why do n00bs, the runners and the like, even find it worth their time? It still goes back to the money. Legit work, as outlined in the hypothetical plan in 20, barely pays enough for low rent living. Sure, you're legit... and you can barely afford to make ends meet, let alone have any sort of a life. Selling drugs in itself or even running it nets a ton more money than even well-to-doers like tenured office drones.

The police can only go off what they hear and if people want their neighborhoods cleaned up, they have to be the ones doing the calls and making their area unwelcoming to gangs. Call the police. Call your city council members.

Except as noted above, people are already calling the cops and the city, and they're being ignored.

@35, I wish I remembered the study, but I'm fairly certain that the average hourly 'wage' of a drug-runner is slightly below that of a fast-food worker. Perhaps it was in "no shame in my game" or some similar book. I think we should be careful not to assume 1) that many of these people have much choice of jobs (discrimination, criminal record, lack of transportation options, etc. can limit opportunities), and 2) that they are always being rational economic actors. When you are surrounded by one type of economic activity, it sort of becomes the default.

#36

Yeah, my comment was written in emotional haste and afterwards I realized it was pretty naive.

The real problem with this dicussion is that there are no crack dealers here. It would be nice to know first hand, not from Snoop Dogg, why they do it. I think our sensibilities say it is more lucrative to do so, but #37 makes a good pont.

#29 -- But a FAIR allocation of enforcement resource would unequivocally mean drastically LESS enforcement in the area of 2nd & Pine, wouldn't it?

Is LESS what you want? And how would this provide relief the writer of the letter above?

it is not that bad, there are shootings in most neighborhoods. it IS downtown. If that is new to you, you will be uncomfortable. I've lived in all sorts of bad places. Downtown Seattle is a ghosttown. I have been messed with a few times, but I also get fucked by rich people that are drunk. So if anything the bad element you're talking about is keeping the elite in check.

Back before the Newmark (the aforementioned building with the former movie theatre) was built, it was the site of a huge Penney's store that closed back in the 80's. THAT was scary: all boarded up, but with lots of little nooks and crannies along the face of it. Too bad it couldn't have been redeveloped, but that's another story entirely.

If you would like to go back and read some comments here that are the CLOSEST to the truth, read #20, #32, and #37.

That's why ending prohibition is the only solution. Our country WILL re-discover this someday. It's only a matter of time. Until then, more of your money in the toilet, more prisons, more social problems.

Drug use is a public health issue, not criminal. Some Americans are finally coming around to this concept! Now we just have to speak up more.

http://www.drugpolicy.org

It really is all Leroy's fault.

It's not as bad as everyone here makes it, in my opinion. Yes, there is a lot of drug and gang activity; but let's be honest, if it wasn't there it would be somewhere else. If you walk through that area real late at night you might get fucked with, but otherwise - even around bar closing - if you just ignore the activity and not let yourself get caught in an alley like an idiot you'll be fine.

I'm around that area all the time late at night for shows or to hit up bars. I even work security at a nearby retailer so personally know some of the regulars of that area and I still don't get messed with. Just use common sense (ie. don't walk around like a victim) and learn to respect the fact that shit has got to be somewhere.

I feel for the people that live in the area, but it's a choice on their part.

I heard Kerlikowski on KUOW a couple years ago saying that police only had time to deal with the "most serious" of crimes. Um, like giving jaywalking tickets? Like stopping (and ticketing) me for riding without a bicycle helmet? But yeah, when I see a car being broken into, they don't have time. When someone is involved in drug activity outside my apartment, they don't have time. I am paying for services I am not getting, then paying again through petty tickets (such as jaywalking) to fill the city coffers. Pure extortion.

the police will tolerate drug activity in certain areas so that people who engage in such activities will congregate there and leave other parts of the city alone....mostly. this obviously happens in poorer areas. when the million dollar condos are finished, the police will take a harder stance on these activities and push the users, dealers, etc to other parts of the city

@39 Ron K:

i didn't say "fair allocation of enforcement resource[s] (though what a vague statement without clarification on your part -- maybe having officers in high crime areas is fair). i said, "fair enforcement". no allocation in there -- whatever you mean by that.

people said they want enforement.

you imply that there is complaining over that enforcment (@27). as if to say we really don't want more enforcement because look what happens.

i'm saying more "fair" -- fair as in just -- enforcement is what is wanted. like i said, just having a couple officers there not arresting people would probably go a long way to making it feel safer.