Free Republic

Across the country, copper and other valuable materials have been stolen from streetlights, statues and even gravesites, costing millions to repair. The 6th Street Bridge in Los Angeles has been cast into darkness after its wiring was stolen.Credit... The 6th Street Bridge in Los Angeles is wired to glow with colorful lights celebrating the city’s spirit. But the bridge, known as the “Ribbon of Light,” goes dark at night now. So do stretches of the busy 405 freeway and dozens of street blocks across the city. In St. Paul, Minn., a man was recently hit by a car and killed...

California officials have approved a first-of-its-kind regulation that will set long-term limits on the amounts of water the state’s urban utilities can use on an annual basis. The State Water Resources Control Board granted unanimous support Wednesday to sweeping conservation measures that are expected to generate about 500,000 acre-feet in water savings each year by 2040. The quantity conserved is enough to quench the thirst of more than 1.4 million households on an annual basis, according to the Water Board. The regulation requires the state’s largest suppliers to calculate individual water budgets based on residential indoor and outdoor water use,...

CV NEWS FEED // A recent analysis by State Financial Officers Foundation (SFOF) Executive Vice President Noah Wall showed that the recent trend of urban crosswalks being painted in “pride” colors is likely not the result of spontaneous decisions by local municipalities but the work of a national LGBTQ activist group. Wall wrote on X (formerly Twitter) Monday that he noticed the surge of rainbow “pride” crosswalks popping up in cities across the country “and haven’t seen sufficient explanation as to why it’s happening, so I decided to do some research.” “Most of the news about these crosswalks has been...

Rising rent prices, a housing struggle, high tax rates, and overcrowding are common issues in many of the cities that top this year’s move-out list. Los Angeles returns in the number one spot, followed by major metropolitan cities (and repeat offenders) like San Francisco, Miami, and Long Island, NY (part of the greater NYC area that PODS services). Unsurprisingly, these cities are also some of the most expensive metro areas in the country.

U.S. News and World Report compiled a rankings list of the best states to live in, 2024. The magazine also compiled a list of the best cities to live in 2023-2024. There are some interesting incongruities between the two. Below I highlight apparent discrepancies between three of the top ten states, and the main cities therein.For example, U.S. News ranks Washington State as the 8th best state to live in. However, in a separate ranking of best places, they rank greater Seattle a very lowly 81st best place to live.That is curious because the timeframes are the same and their...

The Biden administration hopes to dispense thousands of ID cards to migrants in the coming weeks as part of an effort to update the documentation that US government agencies provide illegal border-crossers. Immigration and Customs Enforcement is planning on a “limited rollout” of its Secure Docket Card program this summer that would see roughly 10,000 ID cards distributed to migrants in as many as four US cities, according to Fox News. Two potential locations are Houston and Atlanta, a source told the outlet. The program aims to “modernize documentation provided to some noncitizens,” according to ICE, which notes that the...

Pay day seriously pales compared to rent day — and it’s only getting worse. A new report has found that, since 2019, rent has gone up on average 1.5 times faster than wages in 44 out of the nation’s 50 largest metros, and nowhere more so than in New York City. According to an analysis by StreetEasy of data from Zillow, the US Bureau of Labor Statistics and its own site, the Big Apple has seen the greatest gap in rent growth relative to wage growth in recent years. Specifically, the city watched wages go up 1.2% between 2022 and...

Americans are worried about crime on their streets, but President Biden and the mainstream press corps don’t think that they should be. ABC News claims that “violent crime is dramatically falling.” NBC News asserts that “the drop in crime does not appear to be well understood by large majorities of Americans.” And in his State of the Union address, Biden bragged about a purported drop in crime that was allegedly a result of his efforts. While the administration and its allies are trying to convince Americans that the crime spike that they think they’ve seen in recent years has been...

Tradition is not the worship of ashes, but the preservation of fire. This is what American cities looked like a century ago. Everything you see here was demolished. Why?

Murders have dropped by up to 20% in some major US cities — including the Big Apple — so far this year, according to a new report. New York City has seen a 15% dip in killings in the first three months of 2024 compared to the same period last year, the Wall Street Journal said. The five boroughs had 88 murders in that time period, a significant dip over the 104 in 2023, the outlet said.

“The office district is empty, with boarded up towers, copper thieves, and failing retail,” reports the Wall Street Journal of Democrat-run St. Louis, Missouri. “[E]ven the Panera outlet shut down. The city is desperately trying to reverse the ‘doom loop.’” Let’s look at the mayoral history of the doom-looping St. Louis, shall we? Oh, look, there hasn’t been a Republican mayor in St. Louis since — not a typo — 1949. For 75 years, the people of St. Louis have voted for More of the Same, so excuse me if I don’t whip out a violin over all this unavoidable...

A man with a needle in his arm. Streets littered with trash. Constant retail theft. Cars with broken windows from smash-and-grab auto burglaries. These are some of the images that have been used recently to describe San Francisco. But even if that narrative may have been accurate a year ago, it is now contrary to what we generally see in San Francisco today. In the San Francisco of spring 2024, you instead find commuters grabbing coffees and heading in to their offices; tourists admiring the streets comprised of unique Edwardian and Victorian architecture; friends enjoying the fresh fish at outdoor...

The 75 largest cities in America were collectively $288 billion in debt at the end of fiscal year 2022... 53 major cities that do not have enough money to pay their bills. Yet all of them claimed their budgets were balanced, as is required by law. That means lawmakers understated each city’s debt by not including future costs like employee pensions and healthcare ... New York City has a taxpayer burden of $61,800, the largest by far despite being the most populous. The city has only six cents saved up for every dollar it will need to spend on retiree...

In a recent monologue, Greg Gutfeld focused on some of the high profile crimes that have happened in New York City over the past few weeks and the lame response from the people in charge. Greg talks about the Democrats and their obsession with bail reform and how this places a higher priority on the rights of criminals, instead of law abiding citizens. Despite a lot of talk from Mayor Adams and others, things keep getting worse. Partial transcript via FOX News: So here in New York City, the subway system is running a special lottery, but unlike my used...

For decades, Democrats have controlled the nation’s largest cities. The results have been catastrophic, including high crime rates, blight, failing public educational systems, rampant poverty, and an expanding homeless population. These horrific outcomes are due to Democrats supporting failed policies, such as raising taxes, increasing regulations, growing the government, and refusing to prosecute violent criminals. Consequently, citizens voted with their feet and left in droves, a trend which has started to accelerate. For example, while the country’s population soared sixty million to 341 million since 2000, it was a much different situation in the progressive hellhole of Chicago. The “Windy...

When a wave of migrants began arriving in Democratic-run cities far from the Southern border two years ago, officials welcomed them with open arms. Now they’re limiting aid to new arrivals as their instinct for compassion confronts hard budgetary realities. In recent days, New York and Chicago — two of the nation’s largest cities — have instituted substantial changes to their shelter policies. In Chicago, the city began evicting migrants who had overstayed a new 60-day time limit, saying it did not have the resources to meet the need. In New York, migrants had benefited from the city’s right to...

Reading a campaign speech in Milwaukee this week, Joe Biden boasted of a plan to spend some $36 million on a stretch of 6th Street, just west of downtown Milwaukee. His speechwriter had him listing such federally funded benefits as bike lanes, newly planted trees, and bus lanes to make 6th Street a prettier place to be. And sure, it might at that. Trees are always lovely for pedestrians, though they can obstruct the view of pedestrians, drivers, and bicyclists alike. And bicycles and buses are always generically popular, even though in Milwaukee they each tend to have about the...

“…[F]or I have seen violence and strife in the city. Day and night they go about it upon the walls thereof: mischief also and sorrow are in the midst of it." - Psalm 55:9,10 There is a Mexican NGO called the Consejo Ciudadano para la Seguridad Pública y la Justicia Penal, A.C. which releases an annual list of the world’s 50 most violent cities. The country with the most violent cities on the list was Mexico, with 16. In second place was Brazil, with 10 cities, followed by Colombia with eight. The United States of America was #4 on the...

(NEXSTAR) — Any time you’re looking for a home or new place to live, several factors play a role in your decision. How are the schools? What’s the downtown life like? Is there a Walmart nearby? But we can probably agree that two of the biggest factors in your decision are likely safety and cost. Thanks to some research from personal finance site MoneyGeek, we may have some guidance for you. To find out which cities are both “safe” and “affordable,” MoneyGeek analyzed the safest small and mid-to-large cities in the U.S. Then they factored in the following stats: recent...

(NEXSTAR) — Even if your paycheck is slightly larger this year, you may find yourself on a tight budget, with housing, groceries, and more still sporting high price tags. A recent survey shows most Americans can hardly afford a $1,000 emergency. Unsurprisingly, where you live can have an impact on the wiggle room — or lack of it — in your budget. Personal finance site SmartAsset recently reviewed data from the MIT Living Wage Calculator, which estimates the living wage needed to support various family sizes across the country based on expenditure data for food, childcare, insurance, housing, transportation, and...