Thanks, Jared and Mary
Persistence pays off. For a few years now, I have tried to get something done about the cement island right by my hair salon business at Castor, Faunce and Glendale.
I had reached out to both city officials and state reps. Our City Council person, Brian O’Neill, has an office in the same center as me, but nothing was done.
A huge thanks to state Rep. Jared Solomon and Mary Dougherty, who works in his office, and to whomever planted them. We have some new, lovely trees. No more illegal car washes or loud bands/preaching with no permits (the latter who were extremely rude when we dared ask them to turn their huge speakers down as our clients who would like to relax could hear it in our salon).
This is truly an improvement to one ugly piece of cement.
Eileen Teti
Castor Gardens
Still not safe
Many local politicians, especially DA Larry Krasner, are celebrating the declining murder rate.
Is Philly a safe city? Not so fast. There is still a lot more work to do.
The murder rate, they say, is way down — but actually it isn’t. We had a massive surge in murder from 2020-2022 during the “defund the police” madness. The rate is simply returning to historical norms from 2013-2016.
Maybe the decline is due, in part, to the worst criminals having killed each other off. Maybe it’s partially due to better trauma care for those shot. I wouldn’t take a victory lap just yet.
Police have gotten good at pinpointing future violent crime using AI, and are better able to shift resources to these areas. That’s good. Yet, as anyone knows, this leaves other areas of the city under-patrolled and vulnerable.
Try calling 911 in NE Philly on a weekend. You will not get an officer response for many complaints. That means, if a crime occurred, it did not get reported, and it is not in the statistics.
We have to remember, too, that when criminals are allowed to plea-bargain down crime, such as auto theft to unauthorized use of a vehicle, the stats also look better.
In addition, many crime categories have not gone down. Assaults are up about 15% in recent years. Vehicle theft is way up, too, about 25%. Carjacking is a growing menace. Every carjacking has the potential for violence and murder.
Overall, Philly crime is still about 2½ times worse than the country as a whole. Ten times worse than nearby Rockledge. Nothing to celebrate, Mr. DA.
Just ask all those ladies who recently were attacked and had their purses stolen in Mayfair and Rhawnhurst — ask them how safe they feel.
Richard Iaconelli
Rhawnhurst
Florida justice
A Philadelphia kids football team does so well they win a trip to Florida for a championship game. That has to be a great feeling to be the best in the city and going to Florida for vacation. They will be able to see the sights and enjoy some warm weather. Well eight of them had a different idea. They separated in teams of four and took Ubers to a store. They entered the store and went on a Krasner shopping spree. They entered and shoplifted anything they could get their greedy little hands on to the tune of $2,000. The store called the police. Oops, this isn’t Philadelphia. They get arrested and jailed. This isn’t going to be Krasner’s shoplifting catch-and-release program. It’s going to be the arrest-and-jail program and possibly have the parents flying to Florida to bail out the cretins. Along comes the coach who wants to know if they can be released to play the game. I guess he adheres to the Krasner policy. A couple of things come out of this situation that are intriguing. One, it seems the kids were very organized to the point that you have to question how many times they did this before. Two, Krasner’s policies don’t export well. There was just a big drug bust that included the surrounding counties and the Philadelphia police were involved. At the news conference the DAs from the outlying counties and the Philadelphia Police were there. It was very evident that Krasner was nowhere to be seen. Is this because of his policies or that they don’t trust him to prosecute the criminals to the extent they should be.
Richard Donofry
East Torresdale
