NOLA Murder Rate Leads the Nation...Again (New Orleans: crime rates, unemployment)

[Micktooth]

Originally Posted by Prytania

NOLA.com comments are a joke and hardly representative of the city. That said there isn't much white people can do to help fundamentally broken poor black households in the city. There isn't anything I can say to a young black man as a young white woman he wants to hear.And I do accept it (crime), it's bad but most of it is not simply random like you might get in Detroit...most murders are drug related or the killer knew the victim. I've lived here forever and never been mugged nor have I ever heard gunfire..

I have had family members hold a dying neighbor , who had been shot,in their arms in Lakeview, have a bullet fired through their car while driving back to Old Metairie and hear gunfire nightly while living a few blocks off of St Charles ,Uptown.
Consider yourself fortunate, but probably not the norm.

[WestbankNOLA]

IMHO..
1. People have gotten used to it and or content or they just don't know any different (it's surprising how many New Orleanians had never been out of New Orleans prior to Katrina).
2. Leadership is non-existent from all angles.
3. No accountability what so ever.
4. The race card is played too much by both sides and hinders progress.
5. Education is questionable.
6. Dirty politics consume every aspect of life. Politicians are tied to almost everything in this city man we don't even know about.
7. N.O. is a poor city that becomes harder and harder to make it in every month.
8. No regional cohesiveness. (Everyone thinks that what happens across the lake/river/canal/Delery St/etc. is not their problem).

Add all that up and you get what we have today. So, what do we do?

[Prytania]

No I live near Jefferson Ave. at Magazine.

And that's where I've lived for quite a while.
I have friends at Dryades and Gen. Taylor who hear gunfire but I have never heard it. (And I have lived outside New Orleans before).

I think there is leadership but it comes from the city charter powerless City Council. Stacy Head has had a mouth on her but she hasn't pulled too many punches, and Arnie Fielkow has been a good At Large Councilman.

The race issue is a bit insane. And this ties in with regional issues, as many of the black leaders in New Orleans have tried to use it to gain power within the city, and many people in Jefferson Parish (not all) are some of the most bigoted people I have ever seen. (I don't see this as much with your avg. white New Orleanian). They don't get without New Orleans, Metairie dies, Kenner dies...Jefferson and Orleans need each other but no one wants to actually come out and say it.

I think education is a lot better than it was, my neighbor's kid who went to McGee now attends Lusher...and even many other RSD schools saw improving test scores (and if you can pay for private schools, New Orleans has some of the best around).

I think while a lot of issues are very important, life here is not bad at all. Its only been bad if you have to deal with City Hall which is something I rarely have to deal with. You want to see cities on the brink? Try Detroit, Cleveland...there is no hope there, and its terribly sad.

But I'm going to be throwing my weight behind Mitch Landrieu for Mayor. He is going to run again (and James Carville I believe polled white and black citizens, and right now he has 74% support). Fielkow is not going to run for Mayor but vie for Council again. My only concern is that what's left of the Jefferson machine which is in its death throws, is going to go ALL OUT on the race issue with the elections. I think Landrieu who has done a good job as Lt. Gov., and his sister at Senator who threw her support behind retaining Jim Letten as Federal Prosecutor here (which was unexpected, and infuriated the Jefferson machine).

Now is the time to be here, I think we have a lot going for us...I really do, but it isn't for someone who doesn't want to fight...and maybe that's why there are so many new young people in the city. Older people see things totally differently...but I'm excited.

[colonialsfan]

I lived here for a couple of years after college... Crime was rampant even then.

Didn't have a problem with "black thugs," though. The unemployed bum vandalized our things and attempted to squat on our property was a middle-aged white man.

[Prytania]

I wanted to add this while I was thinking about it. A professor in school once discussed the Rise and Fall of Nations and Civilizations, (at Tulane) and said when reading from a pretty famous book by Oswald Spengler...that nations define themselves by meeting challenges and overcoming them.

If we cannot overcome these problems...its a sign that leaving for somewhere else is only masking a problem that I fear threatens not only New Orleans or Louisiana but the United States. If we cannot stand to meet these challenges, then we I guess to quote a Ben Franklin, "We must hang together, [gentlemen]...else, we shall most assuredly hang separately."

[Micktooth]

Silly us, it's not as bad as the FBI or others thought. The Police Chief calls the numbers "misleading". Feel better now? Police chief calls New Orleans top murder rank misleading - NOLA.com

[meemy]

Originally Posted by Micktooth

Silly us, it's not as bad as the FBI or others thought. The Police Chief calls the numbers "misleading". Feel better now? Police chief calls New Orleans top murder rank misleading - NOLA.com

Oh, you betcha! Why, we all know that a top member of the Moderator cut: bleep would never lie to the tax payers.

And yes, I still do pay property tax on the house that has been in our family for 78 years so I figure that gives me some small say in things.
.

[LindseyLou]

Prytania, good to hear that Mitch Landrieu plans to run again. My personal belief is our city would be in less of a mess had he been elected in the last election.

[pirate_lafitte]

I want to throw this out for a theory. It is a theory of mine that hot, oppressive weather can have an effect on a person's behavior. Just something to think about.

Other than that, the New Orleans crime issue is something I find peculiar because of its size and relative isolation. Then again, sometimes other things can take hold.

[jacksonian]

Don't feel like you're the only one New Orleans. We suffer from the same problems here in Jackson. Maybe we need a coalition between New Orleans, Jackson, and Little Rock. All three are regional cities with high crime and relatively similar populations (NO being larger of course). It'd be great if we could find the funding to host a crime prevention competition to see which city could come up with the best prevention plan, test the plans, and then all 3 cities, plus others as well, could implement the tactics that are the most successful. Hey, we call all strive for better things, right?