Gang Activity in N.VA........... (real estate, foreclosure, crimes)

[normie]

Originally Posted by ICS67

But I also don't think we can discount the risk of gang violence by thinking it's an issue confined to lower income neighborhoods with absolutely no possibility of spillover. Just my two cents.

Well, of course not. Gangs are like termites, they exist everywhere so only a fool discounts the risk of them. And continuing with the termite analogy, I take precautions against termites all the time. That's a lot different from saying my house has a serious termite problem. In fact, it's exactly the opposite. If I didn't take precautions, then I might have a termite problem. Same logic with gangs. We have a strong anti-gang program, therefore it's not a big problem here. IMO.

[Yankeesfan]

How nice that most of us DON'T have to worry about this in our daily lives. However that doesn't mean that it isn't a problem and again, thank you to the law enforcement that is doing a good job so that others can just shrug it off and joke about it. I was shocked to learn recently that the prime recruiting ground in NoVA is junior high, not high school. Sorry I don't remember where the article was published or I would link it here. (Maybe I read from a link here?) So to the parents of students who might be susceptible to gang recruitment, it's a serious issue, and to those students themselves who are trying to resist recruitment at a vulnerable age, I have sympathy and would not just write this off. Also, let's not overlook the fact that the article Normie published about the drop in crime rates in Loudoun also specifically cited the increase in immigration enforcement that occurred at the same time, which was likely a factor in the decreased rate of other crimes.

[mississippimagnolia]

It's an issue of perspective, location, and economics. I haven't seen any indication at all of gang activity in Burke. I can drive a few miles down Old Keene Mill Road and as I get closer to the Springfield Mall area, I start to see the occasional tag. But when we found out we were moving back up here, lots of people told me scary stories about an increase in gang activity in Lake Braddock and Robinson High Schools. "It's different now"..."Things have changed since you were last up here"... OK, really? I have three kids in high school. I asked them directly if they had heard of gang activity in their school...all three looked at me like I was crazy and said "no".

There are certainly active gangs in many areas in Northern Virginia. But too often all of Northern Virginia is painted with the scary "gang and drug problem" brush. My kids are every bit as safe in their schools and in their community here in Burke, Virginia as they were in Oxford, Mississippi.

[ngadude]

Originally Posted by adolpho

Moderator Cut

There is a serious gang problem in Manassas. Black gangs like the Crips, and of course MS-13 for the Salvadorans. I was all too close to it as a school bus driver and substitute teacher for the City of Manassas. I think the situation is even worse in Woodbridge. There was some kind of gang at the Cumberland Ave. apartments in Springfield 15 years ago. I know there is some gang banging at Lee HS, but I would say it is worse at Osbourn in Manassas.

I agree, the Manassas area in some parts does have very serious gang problems. It's one big reason I moved out of my old neighborhood Point of Woods.

I've heard it is bad in some parts of Woodbridge too but I just don't know.

I don't know which schools in the area seem to have larger gang problems than others, though.

I just know what I saw in the way of police reports on activity in my old neighborhood, as well as obvious signs of gang activity in the form of gang graffiti, both in the neighborhood and down by Stonewall Park behind the neighborhood. And, you can't just claim it is "imitation gang graffiti". The Manassas City police have identified a great deal of it as authentic, and they make efforts to have it removed as soon as it is noticed. Unfortunately, it just keeps coming back. A playground right down the block from my townhouse was totally destroyed and gang graffiti spray painted all over the retaining wall behind it (a huge hill was behind that wall), about 2 years ago right before I moved out. The police confirmed that was the work of MS-13.

So, there are some parts of Manassas that most definitely have a gang problem. I'm glad to see other posters here agree with that.

[ngadude]

Originally Posted by Yankeesfan

How nice that most of us DON'T have to worry about this in our daily lives. However that doesn't mean that it isn't a problem and again, thank you to the law enforcement that is doing a good job so that others can just shrug it off and joke about it.

Agree 100%! If not for the efforts of local law enforcement and gang task forces, the problem would really be bad. Anyone who thinks that it is a waste of taxpayer money or property taxes, for gang task forces in this area, is just fooling themselves.

(Sorry for the double post - I thought I edited it to add something to it - but somehow it got partially duplicated - don't know what happened exactly).

[adolpho]

Originally Posted by normie

LOL, you think Lowes Island is actually on an island????? :

OK, time for a momentary veer off topic. The reason this is funny is that a person who lives in Virginia (not Arizona, like you do) would know that the Potomac River is not a wide river. It's definitely not wide enough to have islands with towns. You can easily walk across the Potomac, especially the section of the river that borders Fairfax and Loudoun counties.

Here are some photos to give you an idea of how wide the Potomac is.



These photos are looking from the VA side towards MD.


This photo is looking from the MD side towards VA. It's a shot of Lowes Island (the community) taken from the bike trail in MD. For perspective, look at the walking trail on the VA side, which you can see in both photo #2 and photo #3. If you can see a walking trail from across a river, you know the river isn't that wide.

A few notes for people who are interested in the islands. The actual island named Lowes Island is a pretty spot to kayak to, but it's one of the smaller islands. If it wasn't so pretty it probably wouldn't even merit a name. Do you see the building on the hill in the above photo? Lowes Island is so small you couldn't even put that single building on it. And since the islands keep changing shape due to erosion building a town on any of them would not be a smart idea, even if they were big enough. The islands belong to MD, not VA so a person living on them would not be a Virginian.

BTW, for anyone who's interested the Lowes Island where I live is the name of a community in Sterling. It's beside the river, but definitely not an island. It's part of Cascades, which is near where Rt. 7 crosses Algonkian Parkway.

Anyway, sorry to go off topic for a moment. Back to the subjects of gangs.

There are 15 islands in that vicinity. The Potomac is almost a mile wide at the Wilson Bridge. I looked at the google map and I can see that it is not an island, but a former wetland that was filled in with dirt and rocks. I had never heard of it until several years ago, when I read about the bankrupt golfcourse.

[normie]

Originally Posted by adolpho

There are 15 islands in that vicinity. The Potomac is almost a mile wide at the Wilson Bridge. I looked at the google map and I can see that it is not an island, but a former wetland that was filled in with dirt and rocks. I had never heard of it until several years ago, when I read about the bankrupt golfcourse.

LOL, who cares how wide the Potomac is near the Wilson Bridge? There are no islands near the bridge (unless you want to count National Airport), and definitely no islands with towns on them! More to the point that area is 43 miles from Lowes Island, which is the area we were discussing, the area you claimed was a city built on an island.

What's even funnier is the rest of your post. Where are you getting this stuff? I don't know how to tell you this but your source of information about northern Virginia is pretty unreliable. Try wikipedia, it's not that reliable either but it's better than what you're using right now.

Meanwhile, I will try my best to untangle this latest bit of skewed data. I have no idea what bankrupt golf course you would have read about several years ago. There was a bankrupt golf course in Ashburn, but that was a fairly recent happening. The LI golf course was for sale, but it was never bankrupt. It was bought by Donald Trump, who has recently had some bankruptcies up in Atlantic City--maybe that's what you're thinking of? I'm not sure what gave you the idea the houses were built on filled in wetland. There's a wetland area near the golf course that is parkland--is that what you're looking at? The Heritage Trail goes through there. You see a lot of herons at the golf course, so maybe the back course has a wetland area. But that area's downhill from Lowes Island proper, in other words the area where the homes are built. It has much more boring roots. It's built on the site of two former dairy farms, and you can still see the old silo of one of the farms from Woolington Road.

[normie]

Originally Posted by wingerr8

What kind of precautions did you take against termites?

I hire gang members to scare them away!

[car54]

These gangs are ethnic gangs....no way MS-13, SSL, Crips, etc are going to try to recruit affluent white kids. The only gang problems that affluent white kids could have is if they don't pay their drug debts. Now, that IS dangerous.

[adolpho]

Originally Posted by adolpho

There are 15 islands in that vicinity. The Potomac is almost a mile wide at the Wilson Bridge. I looked at the google map and I can see that it is not an island, but a former wetland that was filled in with dirt and rocks. I had never heard of it until several years ago, when I read about the bankrupt golfcourse.

Trump purchased it from Chevy Chase Bank. Look at a Google Earth Map. The golf course looks like a flood plain of reclaimed land.

http://www.examiner.com/x-5919-Norfo...ang-initiation
It's the one year aniversary of a gang murder against bystanders in Loudon County. I guess we don't have to worry unless it's initiation season.