Atlanta's murder rate and overall crime rate is increasing and it's time the Mayor does something about it (house, living in)

[HH82]

Abandon thread!!!!!

[Atlwarrior]

Originally Posted by atler8

Listen up please:
Call me a "booster" if it makes you feel better but let's keep a reality-based perspective handy please. We're looking at 1.5 months of 2015 data, ok? One & a half month of stats in crime, specifically in murders, do not a year long trend make.
If the number is up 20, 30 or 40% at mid year or at the end of 2015, then I'll agree that we've got a growing problem in the COA.
As one poster mentioned, some types of crimes seem to come and go in waves which is a fact that I can verify given that I've been paying attention to crime stats for decades as a long time metro resident. When I moved here in 1979 and for a long time after that, the yearly number typically came in at around 260-280 murders per year.
As for the "perspective" I mentioned, since the middle of the 2000-2010 decade, the number of murders committed in the COA per year has been near a modern era historic low & in 1 or 2 of those years, it dipped below the prevous modern era low number last reached in 1963 at something like 83.
And what is the mayor supposed to personally do about this anyway? He's promoting the hiring of another 200 police officers which will bring the A.P.D. up much closer to the long time staffing goals that the city has wanted to achieve.
Low crime rate or high rate, Atlanta is not the center of the universe. It's just home.
Chill please...

My thoughts exactly, also these are generally gang drug related murders. According to our monthly meetings and report by a live COA police, the biggest crime in Atlanta is people leaving items visible in their cars and the vehicle being broken into.

[cqholt]

Originally Posted by Atlwarrior

My thoughts exactly, also these are generally gang drug related murders. According to our monthly meetings and report by a live COA police, the biggest crime in Atlanta is people leaving items visible in their cars and the vehicle being broken into.

Cat break ins is an issue all over the city because the victims are too lazy to take their valuables inside with them at night. Car break ins are nearly the perfect crime, when someone can bustva window, take the valuable and continue walking. APD started the clean car campaign to encourage and even punish people for leaving valuables visible in their cars.

[bu2]

Originally Posted by Atlwarrior

My thoughts exactly, also these are generally gang drug related murders. According to our monthly meetings and report by a live COA police, the biggest crime in Atlanta is people leaving items visible in their cars and the vehicle being broken into.

Not just leaving them visible. They have devices that can detect electronics in the car. They drive by, get a hit and break in.

[arjay57]

Originally Posted by cqholt

Cat break ins is an issue all over the city because the victims are too lazy to take their valuables inside with them at night. Car break ins are nearly the perfect crime, when someone can bustva window, take the valuable and continue walking. APD started the clean car campaign to encourage and even punish people for leaving valuables visible in their cars.

Hard for me to agree with blaming the victim.

Who thinks it is okay to go over to some other neighborhood, go onto folk's property at night, peer into their cars, and if you think there is something of value there, smash the window, steal it and run away?

Why should anyone be punished because they are the victim of such behaviour?

[jpk1292000]

Not sure about this thread. I've been in "dangerous" Atlanta 15 years and have never been a victim of crime. I lived in "extremely safe", 95% Lilly White State College PA for 6 years while in college/grad school and was a victim of crime there twice.

Is Atlanta as safe as Seattle or Portland, probably not. Is it as safe or safer than DC, Houston, Chicago, Philadelphia, Miami, Dallas, Boston or Baltimore. Yes...

[UKWildcat1981]

Originally Posted by jpk1292000

Not sure about this thread. I've been in "dangerous" Atlanta 15 years and have never been a victim of crime. I lived in "extremely safe", 95% Lilly White State College PA for 6 years while in college/grad school and was a victim of crime there twice.

Is Atlanta as safe as Seattle or Portland, probably not. Is it as safe or safer than DC, Houston, Chicago, Philadelphia, Miami, Dallas, Boston or Baltimore. Yes...

I agree I don't think Atlanta is that bad but I am going on my own personal experience, I believe Atlanta is really safe compared to Memphis and New Orleans not as safe as Nashville and Louisville KY but it from what I heard does about average in terms of all crime for its size.

[Caleb Longstreet]

Originally Posted by Ant131531

Seriously, this is getting ridiculous. Atlanta has had 14 murders so far this year, up 133% from last year and last year in particular was violent. Atlanta was doing so well back in 2010 and 2011. Now its been increasing every year since.

Source: http://www.atlantapd.org/pdf/crime-d...B4CFD97B50.pdf

Seriously, is the mayor doing anything about this? Crime is on the rise in Atlanta and that disways people from wanting to move here. A city wanting to be world class should not have a murder rate of over 20/100k(project the current murder rate and it would put it over 20 for the year).

I know we like to talk about development projects, the economy, transit, etc, but crime is a really big deal and makes the city look bad because then it appears on the "Most dangerous cities" list.

Now now, don't upset the oh so,cool ITP crowd! They have a monorail and ferris wheel to protect! Careful, you might have people thinking Atlanta is not as great as they would have you believe!

[sedimenjerry]

Originally Posted by jpk1292000

Not sure about this thread. I've been in "dangerous" Atlanta 15 years and have never been a victim of crime. I lived in "extremely safe", 95% Lilly White State College PA for 6 years while in college/grad school and was a victim of crime there twice.

Purely anecdotal. Anyway, is it possible you took more precautions in Atlanta and let your guard down in State College? I'm always more conscious of my belongings when I'm in a "higher crime area" like downtown. Walking I usually keep my my hands in my pockets or at minimum stay somewhat aware of who's around. Going to my local grocery store? I don't worry about a thing. When I parked my car overnight at my friend's place near GT I locked everything up, locked the glove box and made sure nothing was remotely visible. At home I've often just left my GPS in the back behind the seat. It's not visible, but an easy target. But I'm not as worried about crime here.

[atler8]

Many of you on this thread are relative newbies in Atlanta & cannot fathom how absolutely out of control the crime situation was here years ago. I can excuse you because as you talk here, how could you know? Nevertheless I had hoped that what I wrote here earlier would have been the end of my contribution but I see that a bit more historical perspective may be needed.
When I was a newly-arrived Atlantan circa 1979, the city had just about single-handedly copped the title of "Murder City" away from D.C. and other cities.
The crime rate & number of murders were both so out of control that the governor called in the Ga. State Patrol to augment the city police force.
After a horrific incident that included the murder of a doctor here for the A.M.A. convention as his group walked on Piedmont, the Wall Street Journal ran a front page article that drew national attention to the situation in Atlanta. At that time I worked at the airport & I recall the morning when we were crowned as the new crime capital by the WSJ. The freshly-arriving planes dropped their passengers into the terminal bearing the new morning edition of the WSJ & instantly we workers in the airport had to bear the brunt of the onslaught of derision & nastiness directed at us from John Q. Public from out of town who were delighted to have new material with which to poke at Atlanta. It was with a measure of delight & scorn that we were harangued as if the crime situation was our own personal fault & something to be ashamed of.
Concurrently, in the now long gone shabby business area that has been replaced by Centennial Olympic Park, a business owner erected a huge billboard that towered over his business & parking lot in full view of the front of the Omni (today's CNN Center). The billboard had a running tally in huge letters & numbers of the latest tally of murders & other assorted crimes in the city.
I could go on but suffice to say that it was a pretty horrible time to have to admit on a public stage that you were an Atlantan. If you didn't live through that period here then, you just can't fathom the depths of how bad it was & any response that our improved situation of today in the COA only mirrors & corresponds with the improvement in the national picture of violent crime, just isn't accurate nor does it fully cut the mustard.