It’s always been there,” O’Leary said. “Our goal is to curb it or displace it. We’re not going to make it go away entirely and I would be a fool to say that we are.
I’m not sure this cop was meant to really say that. An amusing admission of the real inability of our law enforcement strategies to actually prevent or reduce crime- almost all the current efforts used in Oakland are the same- at best they just displace crime, so it’s easier to say hey, we dropped crime on this corner, just don’t ask us about where it moved too ok. thanks. Of course we need and want police to respond to deal with crime in progress and to protect our society, but do we ever ask what we are expecting of our law enforcement, and are we holding them accountable for what does or does not improve in our communities? Crackin heads doesn’t seem to be much of an effective prevention strategy either, given the size of our prison populations 😦
Steve Spiker 