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Y Its only going to get worse. What's been occurring in the streets from 2014-2016 has parallels to 2009-2011 Chicago before their 500 homicide years... If the Steel City does not have an intervention it will become exactly like what happened to the Windy City. If you didn't know "Chi-Raq to Clipsburgh" is a saying in the music now, but I'm guessing more people will know the meaning soon enough due to Pittsburgh 's current state for African American inner city youth and struggling communities.
I have been feeling this through those folks that live in the rougher parts of town over the past couple of years and it is escalating as far as from what I am hearing, but the racial tension is really way up there. Frustration and anger comes to mind.
What will be the outcome? Will the murders stay in the same parts of the city as the map that everyone has seen shows and the predominantly white areas be almost murder free zones? Will there be spillover? If there is no spillover, will anything change as far as policing and policy, or will people just not care because it is confined? You can cut racial tension with a knife these days and I keep thinking we are going to see something pretty big go down that is more racially motivated, but who knows? Sure seems stressful anymore. People seem very desperate in poor areas. Social media isn't doing them any favors.
"I don't normally call when I hear one or two shots. But this was different. There were 2-3 single shots fired and then a series of bursts in which 5-6 shots came together as if from an automatic rifle," said Ms. Dexheimer, who lives across an alley that runs behind the Franklin Avenue scene of the shooting.
^
Something about this quote is pretty disturbing.
That's just how unsafe, it is in the worst part of Allegheny County and probably parts of Alliquippa (Beaver County). For example, in "UpTown Homewood" (Homewood North) where gunfire is slightly more common than J-Town Wilkinsburg ("Franklin/Sperling" gang claimed streets in Wilkinsburg south of Penn Ave) - there were gunshots not reported in the case of a double youth homicide occurring at a section 8 apartment complex full of a dozen families. It was just a week before Christmas. The community which has always been forced to be somewhat immune to gunfire is now starting to be controlled by it... Once not afraid of living with gang on gang gunfire, the community is now starting to reach a breaking point. Their reliving with the fact gangs of this generation are back at early 90's levels/will son be forcing their way back on top of the neighborhood in many places.... Try living with this, there's terror of gang member's gunfire for both random acts and reporting it to the police...
Quote:
Never heard of this here but out west, this is typical international gang/drug behavior. Watched an old neighborhood go bad until I moved out. No rules, no remorse, no conscience, and no fear of the police. I will be surprised if this isn't a drug turf spat.
Me either. I'm guessing the police will down play it somehow though.
My husband was hung up on by a 911 dispatcher last year because "nobody else called in gunshots" in our North Side neighborhood. I guess if you want to empty a magazine or two, Perry South is the place to do it.
I have been feeling this through those folks that live in the rougher parts of town over the past couple of years and it is escalating as far as from what I am hearing, but the racial tension is really way up there. Frustration and anger comes to mind.
What will be the outcome? Will the murders stay in the same parts of the city as the map that everyone has seen shows and the predominantly white areas be almost murder free zones? Will there be spillover? If there is no spillover, will anything change as far as policing and policy, or will people just not care because it is confined? You can cut racial tension with a knife these days and I keep thinking we are going to see something pretty big go down that is more racially motivated, but who knows? Sure seems stressful anymore. People seem very desperate in poor areas. Social media isn't doing them any favors.
Under the current ways of society, most without an education or high paying craft see no hope. The youth in gangs from Zones 1-6, Wilkinsburg/the Eastern Suburbs/the Mon Valley/the Stowe Rocks housing projects are feuding/will continue to be because a bad state in the home place & at large in low income, predominantly black-mixed communities. That state is in a bad sate as a result of the following: inter-generational poverty, historic redlining/segregation/the racist implications of Urban Renewal, poor education, mass incarceration, etc. There needs to be total rehabilitation of local ghettos and nationally large scale reform. What the white people in power do/have done to in order to curb crime and violence only perpetuates the cycle for the next generation. Mass incarceration and gentrification are not the correct answers for helping improvised, black people and black-on-black gang/drug violence. Its more deep seeded. If you're concerned about riding a bike in the summer because of stray bullets, then you have stake in the high concentration of murder in Allegheny County. If you want murder to stop happening on Franklin Avenue or Bedford Avenue or Hamilton Avenue or Jenny Lind St or Warrington Ave or Mt. Pleasant Road or on Crucible St, then you have stake in something larger... Something that requires more utilization of POWER than handcuffs, police cars, court rooms, then prison sentences to 6 X 10 cages or hipsters+yuppies+urban pioneers moving in to neighborhoods, raising the rent & then mass eviction notices...
Mass incarceration is the new inter-generational slavery for African Americans... In 1995-'96 Wilkinsburg's top gangsters were hit with the RICO Act. Since then every so often (generationally) there have drug busts for big heroin/cocaine rings and smaller gang indictments targeted at their successors. Each time law enforcement/the courts sentence the indicted dealers, they are simply replaced by a next generation of ready, brazen-bonafied criminals. By mass incarceration, the home place get's wrecked; as the girlfriends and children of gangsters are forced to suffer economically with the loss drug money. Not that its wrong, but this often perpetuates the cycle of drug dealing within the family. Free My Daddy T-shirts are being worn in Pittsburgh ghettos just has much as RIP/RWG Dad by gang members and their poor African American peers... It seems as if black on black murders fuel the war on drugs & white mass shootings fuel the talk for mental illness and gun control. As just like in the ole' Jim Crow/Slavery lynching times, the demands for the police to catch- the next best thing after black man with a gun (who the neighborhood teens won't rat on due to the G-Code) is a black man with drugs (someone who will get snitched on by himself or anybody who is looking to get less jail time).
Meanwhile, "skin color"/"race" (other than the one Human Race) superiority/income/demographic based large scale gentrification and/or redevelopment will also only make a false glimmer of hope for Wilkinsburg and other communities. Sure there needs to be money to revitalize the quality of life for residents of Wilkinsburg and other places, but doing what's been done/continues to be done in East Liberty/Central Northside will not help the suffering black population at large. Gentrification & project closer just simply pushes poverty, crime, segregation, poor schools and mass incarceration to the suburbs or somewhere else in the City for the matter. For example, the branch of the Wilkinsburg gang from Hamentt Place/Kelly West/Pebbles Square still exist- but they've just moved their business further deeper into the borough's troubled neighborhoods, to the municipality of Penn Hills and to the abandoned houses still left in Western Wilkinsburg. Also, similarly said for the gangs in the 3200 Ward St area of South Oakland, Lower North Side, the Lower Hill District, Garfield and demolished hilltop/valley housing project communities (such as St. Clair Village, 3200 Arlington Heights, Garfield Heights, Elmore Sq, Whiteside Road, Broadhead Manor, Westgate Village, etc.)... What about the places over seas that do better taking care of the poor, while at the same time blossoming their city. Why can't learn from them before their system strengthens their economy and is too far ahead of us?
To me, the black people who are put in power are often just proxy leaders that have been elected in place to help control the impoverished blacks. But there is no real solution!!! Black on Black violence will exist until past the year 3000 in Wilkinsburg, the 412 hoods and in the US in general... Unless the outside rich/government, in between middle class and subjugated poor community can ALL come together with money and new policy.
However, in this country the middle class don't have the luxury of having much to spare anymore & the Top Percentile rich folks/their close politician friends are too self concerning, ignorant or prejudice to act on what needs to be done... Meanwhile, the poor are often too f***ed up in their own **** to wipe the **** out their ***es and won't come together to better themselves...
Currently there's no $$ value on "uneducated" black male life except for those in either in [A]the corrections system or [b] NFL-NBA-Musicial entertainment. It seems as if black on black murders fuel the war on drugs & white mass shootings fuel the talk for mental illness and gun control. As just like in the ole' Jim Crow/Slavery lynching times, the demands for the police to catch- the next best thing after black man with a gun (who the neighborhood teens won't rat on due to the G-Code) is a black man with drugs (someone who will get snitched on by himself or anybody who is looking to get less jail time).
Last edited by Uptown kid; 03-10-2016 at 05:04 PM..
"I don't normally call when I hear one or two shots. But this was different. There were 2-3 single shots fired and then a series of bursts in which 5-6 shots came together as if from an automatic rifle," said Ms. Dexheimer, who lives across an alley that runs behind the Franklin Avenue scene of the shooting.
^
Something about this quote is pretty disturbing.
I live on the border of the city and Wilkinsburg, and about 6/10 of a mile from Homewood. I pretty much follow the same protocol
You would know Franklin Avenue by its reputation synonymous with violence, gangs and drug if you were a low income, African American native to Pittsburgh from anywhere near Wilkinsburg or places like the Zone 5/Woodland Hills communities of Lincoln-Lemington, Homewood, East Hills, Larimer, Braddock/southern North Braddock, South Swissvale or Rankin (rivals mostly).
Franklin Avenue stretches from (technically the edge of Greater Park Place)/Pebbles Square through Franklin to Princeton Park (four of the boroughs neighborhoods, two voting wards and two gang territories). The streets from Ross to Rebbecca Ave comprise the borough's "Franklin" neighborhood, but its crime level spills into Patton St, Reed St. Morrow St, blocks of Monview Pl, Midland St, Dell Way, blocks of Ella St, Campbell St & Ardomore Bvld in the "Sperling" & "Princeton Park" borough neighborhoods which are nicer (other than the listed streets).
Things have changed since this maps creation in the mid 2000's... Almost all of "Upper Central/Signer Place", half of "Sperling", 85% of "Princeton Park" & 60% of "Laketon-McNary" have gotten worse. The "Park Triangle, Franklin Hunter Park and Highschool" areas are rock bottom & sadly over with. Though "Hamnett Place, half of Sperling, Kelly West, Pebbles Square" are far less active and are almost done redeveloping, revitalizing, gentrifying, (or what ever you wanna call it when more whites move in)... Meanwhile, the blue areas continue to do so well that their disassociated with the core of Wilkinsburg that's either declining or at rock bottom.
Franklin Ave in general but also particularly around that block area is among the most notorious streets in J-Town Wilkinsburg (by the Johnston WB School)... Not even the number of people shot- but rather the only thing that surprises me is that: the shooting was not in "UpTown" (Highschool area, Park Triangle, Hunter Park, half of Laketon) or "Uptop" (Singer Place & the Upper Central areas) Wilkinsburg which been seen slightly more violence recently.
I have predicted this type of violence several times on this forum, and have in a way been preparing readers for this during my entire existence on this forum. The amount of tension on streets is like Mentos in a Deit Coke Bottle, waiting to explode. This violence is nothing more than a dire and stark response to the powers that be (City Government, housing authority, school board, police/judicial system) which control this improvised black population where violence is concentrated. Meanwhile, they are continuing to ignore areas in which they need to fix. And next year they want to mix 14-19 year old males from Wilkinsburg & Homewood, arguably the two worst areas (now that the Hill District projects are mostly raised and redeveloped), which have certain rival gangs that have a 26 year old, on and off, but horrifically violent feud!!! Its only going to get worse in that whole Westinghouse area. What's been occurring in the streets from 2014-2016 has parallels to 2009-2011 Chicago before their 500 homicide years... If the Steel City does not have an intervention it will become exactly like what happened to the Windy City. If you didn't know "Chi-Raq to Clipsburgh" is a saying in the underground music now, but I'm guessing more people will know the meaning soon enough due to Pittsburgh 's current state for African American inner city youth and struggling communities.
Fantastic analysis as always Uptown. You truly have a talent for crime analysis of our city.
Currently there's no $$ value on "uneducated" black male life .....
I don't get it? What is wrong with working at Home Depot? Costco? Landscaping? Lots of people like their jobs that are physical or labor like. You don't have to be anything more. Just working is healthy. Who cares, so long as you are making a living and enjoying your life?
From another current thread on recent Pgh violence:
Quote:
Originally Posted by gladhands
No, it's money. It's always money.
Don't know if this is true, was told to me as I was discussing the shooting with a guy working at the surplus store downtown earlier today: One of the surviving (male) victims was apparently the primary target. His last Facebook post before the shooting was a selfie of him, in a Mercedes, flashing a large stack of cash.
I haven't been able to find corroboration in online news sources, not sure where he got his info.
From another current thread on recent Pgh violence:
Don't know if this is true, was told to me as I was discussing the shooting with a guy working at the surplus store downtown earlier today: One of the surviving (male) victims was apparently the primary target. His last Facebook post before the shooting was a selfie of him, in a Mercedes, flashing a large stack of cash.
I haven't been able to find corroboration in online news sources, not sure where he got his info.
Officials refused to confirm or deny that armed guards were at the hospital during the press conference which I found odd. I haven't seen the names of the survivors released which is also a little odd.
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