Posted on 08/01/2010 4:33:22 PM PDT by Libloather
Layoffs to gut East St. Louis police force
BY NICHOLAS J.C. PISTOR
Posted: Friday, July 30, 2010 2:15 pm
EAST ST. LOUIS - The Rev. Joseph Tracy said he’s tired of going to funerals. And now, he suspects he’ll be going to more of them.
"It’s open field day now," said Tracy, the pastor of Straightway Baptist Church here. "The criminals are going to run wild."
Gang activity. Drug dealing. Cold-blooded killing. Tracy worries that a decision to shrink the police force by almost 30 percent will bring more of everything.
The pastor voiced his concern on Friday at a raucous special City Council meeting at which East St. Louis Mayor Alvin Parks announced that the city will layoff 37 employees, including 19 of its 62 police officers, 11 firefighters, four public works employees, and three administrators. The layoffs take effect on Sunday.
(Excerpt) Read more at stltoday.com ...
Nobody in east St. Louis will co-operate with the cops anyway. I think they call it snitching. Reaping what you sow can be hell.
Time to arm up.
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City leaders tried to make the cuts through furloughs, but a federal arbitrator decided that the furloughs violated contracts and ordered the city to repay workers $510,000. Several weeks ago, Parks said he hoped the city’s decision not to contest the arbitrator’s repayment ruling would bring the unions to the table to discuss alternatives to the layoffs.
Yet on Friday when the council voted on repaying the $510,000, it failed to get the four votes needed for the financial move. The vote was the same 3-2 split as the layoffs.
The city’s Financial Advisory Authority, which was given oversight of city finances when the city received a state bailout in 1991, voted July 23 to give the city 15 days to get them a balanced budget or they would intercept state funding. That interception would mean the authority would take over paying city bills.
“We believe that we have accomplished what the FAA needed us to do to get them a budget that shows a balance,” Parks said of the layoffs.
At one point 50 layoffs were projected. That number decreased because the city deferred its 2005 bond series payments by one year, which resulted in a savings of more than $500,000.
The town is falling apart. Gangs roam and run the neighborhoods. There was almost complete white flight this past decade when blacks become almost 98% of the demographics.
Crime is on a steady increase due to poverty and complete lack of opportunity. Land on the outskirts is fouled with poisons from unregulated industrial and agricultural waste disposal which begam decades ago.
Successive black mayors have not had the ability to stem the the town's dreadful downword spiral.
In yesteryear when East St. Louis was a working class town with opportunities to make a living in the small businesses and factories, several notables were born there, including Hank Bauer, Jimmy Connors, Al Joyner and Shelley Winters (nee Schrift).
They didn't stick around or come back when they achieved success in a world where capitalism was not a dirty word.
Leni
Those Amish are wacky!
East St. Louis citizens need to "insource" their protection.
In East Saint Louis the cops and the criminals are one in the same.
Tried 'em. Didn't like 'em. Could've killed my own dinner - if I had a grill on board.
Well Rev, arm yourself and your flock and don’t let the criminals run wild but once. A dead criminal isn’t a threat to the community.
When you rely on others to care for you, you’re a pet.
And you thank him daily - no?
Arming up will get you arrested, unless you stay home or in your fixed place of business with your piece. No help if you’re out and about in East St. Louis. This is Illinois we’re talking about, the most egregious infringer of the right to bear arms among the several states.
I made that same mistake myself back in the early 90s.
Diverse?
The city is 97.74% black.
What is the gun control situation in E St. Louis?
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