MEMORANDUM - Jacksonville



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JACKSONVILLE CITY COUNCIL

RESEARCH DIVISION

PUBLIC HEALTH AND SAFETY COMMITTEE MINUTES

PUBLIC FORUM ON CRIME AND SAFETY

DECEMBER 10, 2007

6:00 P.M.

WAYMAN MINISTRIES – SPIRIT OF LIFE WORSHIP CENTER

1176 LABELLE STREET

Attendance: Kevin Hyde (Chair), Committee Members, M. Jones, Gaffney, Holt, Joost, Redman and Yarborough

Other City attendees: Council Members W. Jones and Bishop; JSO ShAdCo director Gary Dickinson; JSO Zone Captain Tom Hackney; Jay Plotkin – Chief Assistant State Attorney; Lynn Westbrook – Public Works Department; Nancy Kilgo – JEA; Charles Grigg – Health Department;

The meeting was called to order at 6:08 p.m.

Chairman Hyde introduced the committee members and guests, thanked everyone for attending and especially thanked Pastor Griffin, for hosting the meeting. In his introductory remarks Mr. Hyde stated that crime is a problem and a concern city-wide and something that the city as a whole needs to tackle. He noted that violent crime is not just a Jacksonville problem; he was in Cincinnati earlier in the day and they are holding a forum similar to this one tonight as well.

Summary of Public Comments

• Get involved in ShAdCo in your area and help the JSO help the community. Hiring ex-felons is important, as is youth education (including GED training). Neighborhood cleanups help increase community pride, especially in older neighborhoods.

• Tim Lawther of the Duval County Health Department reported that the department sees the rise in violent crime as a serious public health issue, and we should be all about prevention. He encouraged interdisciplinary cooperation among the many groups and agencies that have a part to play in the solution. The Health Department recommends a 5-prong strategy: 1) data collection; 2) a community-based policy development task force; 3) local social epidemiological research; 4) a violent death review task force to analyze each incident; and 5) evaluate interventions for success and replicate those that work. We need to break the cycle of violence, and the “big picture” issues that cause the cycle are all interrelated – poverty, racism, disease.

• The Northside needs a more visible police presence and more attention on and enforcement of laws against loitering. Need police substations in high crime areas with officers going out and talking to neighbors to solicit information on criminal activity. The Sheriff needs to work with owners of high crime, low income apartment complexes. Enforce the curfew. Send JSO officers into the schools to be visible and to develop a rapport with students. Everyone needs to work as a team.

• Crime problems are not isolated to one part of Jacksonville – crime affects everyone, everywhere. Coordinate a united front – Sheriff’s Office, Mayor, City Council, School Board, non-profits, etc. More police are needed in schools, and work on decreasing the dropout rate. Pick the 5 big things that need doing and get to work on them. This is a terrible time for a tax cut.

• Chairman Hyde reminded the audience of the January 29th property tax referendum and encouraged everyone to become informed about the issues at stake and to vote.

• Adults need to talk more with the youth of our city, especially those who have already been involved in serious crimes. Ask them what happened in their lives that caused them to end up where they have. What can we learn from their personal experiences that can save others?

• Council Member Jones suggested that the committee hear from youth in the Juvenile Detention Center and from several middle and high schools.

• Forums like these are needed on a regular basis, not just when there’s a time of crisis. We need change in our community and that could happen through unified action by the churches – the city’s largest resource. Churches can organize the manpower to deal with community problems, but they need to get out in the streets and see what’s really going on.

• Jay Plotkin, Chief Assistant State Attorney: Jacksonville already has a ready resource of youth who have been tried and convicted as adults who could be interviewed on the subject of what’s happening and why.

• Consider installation of electronic gunshot monitors. Widely distribute post cards for citizens to mail in with crime reports. Hold crime prevention programs to teach the general public how to help the JSO – what to look for, how to spot crimes, how to report what you see. Have police live in mobile homes in all parks.

• Gary Dickinson, JSO ShAdCo director: ShAdCo is the ultimate in crime prevention, with over 2,000 active, caring citizens involved. Hot Spot crime reporting cards already exist, and Operation Safe Streets already distributes pamphlets with crime prevention and reporting tips.

• Council Member Gaffney asked the JSO to explain the law on loitering. Assistant Chief Hackney stated that in order to be enforceable by the JSO, No Loitering signs must be posted on the property. The curfew for youth under age 18 is 11:00 p.m. Sunday through Thursday nights and 12 midnight on Friday and Saturday nights. Problems with under-staffing cause an inability to deal with issues like loitering – high priority calls are stacked 2 and 3 deep for officers on duty and they rush from one to another and are unable to do preventive policing like questioning loiterers. Average response time to Priority 1 calls is 7-8 minutes; Priority 2 calls average 20-30 minutes.

• JSO Assistant Chief David Kauffman: the Sheriff’s Office is just starting an initiative dealing with multi-family rental housing that looks like it will be successful; School Resource Officers (SROs) are already in all middle and high schools; the Police Athletic League has over 2,300 youth registered in its programs; the Matrix House program for ex-offender re-entry is running successfully; Hot Spots tip cards are definitely followed up and reports made to ShAdCos within a month or two; lots of positive things are already being done.

• The churches are vital to bringing the spiritual element to bear on the community’s problems. We need to break down the barrier between church and state. Don’t tax churches.

• Some activities for youth are already taking place, but more are needed. Parents are failing their children so neighborhoods need to step up and help with child rearing as previous generations did. We all need to take the crime problem and its solutions personally.

• Need a greater rapport between the JSO and the citizens. JSO does not follow up sufficiently on crime calls and that just discourages the community from bothering to report incidents at all. Need a greater police presence and more visibility; the new JSO cars aren’t as visible as the older cruisers – smaller lights, smaller, less reflective decals. We need fewer police cars and more police officers; double up officers in each vehicle. There are too many police officers undercover – need more in uniform being a visible presence in the community.

• Thank you to Wayman Ministries for doing good work in this troubled area. ShAdCos are vital to solving the problem. Reports are followed up. She conveys ShAdCo reports and information back to her neighborhood through an e-mail network. Citizens want to know how they can help – tell them what they can do.

• The Northwest Quadrant needs a local Marshal Plan like the effort that rebuilt Europe after World War II. Involve local black-owned businesses in the rebuilding effort.

• Jacksonville’s problems are a lack of leadership, too much partisanship and not enough concern for the problems of the little people. Jacksonville’s Northside gets no help at all compared with the resources that go to the Southside.

• Develop a system to take away public assistance benefits (food stamps, rent assistance, etc.) from the families of criminals, starting with a 1% reduction for a first offense, 2% for a second offense, etc. The families of criminals have to feel the effects of what they allow to happen.

• JSO officers are overworked and underpaid, and we need more officers. Ministers should have their congregations adopt an apartment complex and show care and concern for the children living there. The churches need to organize and be of service to the neighborhoods.

• Community involvement and activity are vital; the JSO is stretched too thin.

• Check out the web site – a great electronic community resource. The process of doing background checks on potential community volunteers takes too long and is so discouraging that many good people give up and quit trying to help.

• Everyone makes mistakes in their lives but can learn from those mistakes and become better people. Ex-felons need a chance to get jobs and rebuild their lives.

• Mentorship for youth is important, but needs to be continuous and comprehensive, not just a quick random visit every once in a while. Youth need connections with young professionals in the community to see what success looks like. Get the police out of their cars and walking the streets again. We need to empower children to care about their community.

• Jacksonville, like other cities, is finally witnessing the results of the crack epidemic in the 1980s and 1990s – crack babies and broken families have helped cause our crime problems.

• Jacksonville has never utilized the federal Enterprise Zone and Empowerment Zone programs the way they were intended. There is no sense of black history in Jacksonville, and no innovation in how we deal with community problems.

• Cut the recidivism rate through us of the WorkNet program, which involves 25 – 60 hours of workforce training for hard-to-place clients, including practical job search and interviewing skills. Productive jobs are the key to stopping recidivism.

• Take note of the civil rights restoration program held last Saturday at the African-American Chamber of Commerce. The community has to step up and take responsibility for itself; the JSO can’t do it alone.

• Stop the revolving door in the prisons and keep dangerous felons locked up. Lack of jobs is not the problem behind most criminal action.

• The mentally ill have terrible problems with housing, social services, etc. that make their lives extremely difficult. We could save a lot of police time and effort if we didn’t keep arresting the mentally ill for things they can’t help.

• Implement the JCCI report. All of the issues brought up tonight were studied by JCCI over the course of a year, and there are findings and recommendations for all of them. Take the report and start doing something with those recommendations.

Chairman Hyde thanked the attendees for their ideas and suggestions and for being willing to become a part of the solution to the city’s problems. He stated that the PHS Committee will produce a plan for consideration by the City Council by the end of January.

There being no further business, the meeting was adjourned at 8:35 p.m.

Jeff Clements, City Council Research

630-1405

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