"What reduces crime in the country is having relationships with people who live in communities."And yet...
---Cedric Alexander, in the AJC
In Atlanta one mayoral candidate wants businesses to hire their own security because she doesn't think the APD should (or can?) police the area. Sounds like a bit more than an "arms length" relationship.
This is not without precedent. Folks in midtown (think Ansley Park and Sherwood Forest) have ponied up for their own police patrols, Midtown Blue, for a few decades now. So in the Eh, Tea, 'ell it isn't just the downtrodden undeserving of police protection.
Now you might dismiss Dunwoody's Citizen Patrol as a creeping expansion of the bureaucratic disease of Taxing Without Delivering but as all things Dunwoody it is more nuanced. We have a PD obsessed with Mo' Betta Toys for the Boys leading to pre-emptive replacement of "patrol" cars with shiny new SUVs. After all these are take-home cars and appearances count--just not in our neighborhoods. These are primarily for getting to and from home's Barcalounger and the office Aeron--stylin' transport between two stylin' destinations. We ended up with two stoned birds that needed to be killed so they deputized some of the locals, re-branded the patrol cars and sent them into the neighbors to, well, "patrol." Since they're unarmed, we should all feel safer.
But don't you wonder if we'd be safer if it were not all about money?
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