The blame game: While everyone talks about how horrible the crime rate is in Dallas, it seems everyone is pointing fingers ("No. 1 With a Bullet," July 31, and "Protection Racket," August 7, by Jim Schutze). Well, add mine to the list, because I point them at the city's residents, ALL of them. Gee, a car was stolen. Heck, thousands were stolen. Hundreds of houses were broken into. Who do you think is committing most of this crime? Hmm. Could it be, oh, I don't know, young people?
Those of us who teach in the DISD have begged the community to help us mentor, support and guide our 166,000 students, mostly poor and in dire need of help. Some great souls have stepped up, but many schools have few or no volunteers. I see the same old group of "community activists" complain about lack of minority student achievement or high dropout rates. Funny, I don't see these people unless they are in front of a camera. They certainly haven't come to my students' neighborhoods, or they would see some very terrible conditions that literally breed crime.
I have been asking around the city to get an initiative for the area of apartment complexes that are close to Buckner Boulevard/Peavy Road/John West Road. It needs a concerted community effort to save a generation of kids from crime and poverty. Readers: Drive there and see if you want to live there.
Where are the vocal reverends who criticize the police? Why don't they minister to the single mothers to help them overcome the tendency to allow ex-cons and drug dealers to use their apartments for their criminal activities?
Where are the Hispanic activist lawyers? They could sponsor literacy and ESL classes for the parents. They could help us reduce the number of gangbangers whose parents are oblivious to what is going on.
Where are the African-American "Warriors" of days past? Why don't they baby-step across the apartment lots, walking past drug dealers and hookers?
Why won't the mainly Anglo business community get off their "crack high" of signature bridges and sports arenas?
People buy homes where they feel safe, not where they see a team play ball. I would like to see fewer bingo parlors and more restaurants and stores in East Dallas.
No, the same faces on local TV would rather complain and scream racism. These leaders from the minority community serve only themselves. If they TRULY cared about their youths, they would be on Buckner Boulevard, or Kings Road, or Illinois or Fitzhugh every day and every night, fighting tooth and nail for the lives and souls of their "constituents."
Prove me wrong, Dallas. Give a damn! Get off your duff and help us. If we can't keep them in school, whose house or car will be hit next?
Diane Birdwell
Dallas
Some other guy named Schutze: Your article last week, "Protection Racket," was attributed to Jim Schutze, but I'm confident that this wasn't the handiwork of the Jim Schutze that I knew and politically grew up on at the Dallas Times Herald. That Jim Schutze would never accuse John Wiley Price of race baiting while simultaneously playing the race card himself. But, if Laura "The Horror" Miller can fool the electorate in Dallas, I guess Jim was just another casualty.
The Dallas Morning News editorial raised the issue of race for no newsworthy or apparent reason. Similar to the old cliché, "some of my best friends are black," they showed their true color. In deference to his stated journalistic independence, Jim used the reverse discrimination technique as well. You know, just mention affirmative action to any redneck and they believe that the Negroes are at the door again, begging as usual. Invoke the name John Wiley Price and it's news.
What is sad is that with all the space the Observer has, you should have provided your readers with a deep dig of the facts on crime in Dallas. Intelligent readers, regardless of race, want to know the full scope of the demographics. What part does teen and adult unemployment or underemployment play in the numbers? Is there a lack of neighborhood crime-watch groups and community policing in the areas most affected?
Terrell Bolton has to be accountable just as the mayor does. And if she would do more to bring jobs and reduce homelessness, both of them would fare much better in the eyes of Dallasites. And by the way, nobody visiting Dallas has ever been told not to look up at the Empire State Building in order to avoid getting mugged.
Jim, get real and get real fast!
Vincent Lewis Hall
Dallas
Race racketeers: The Dallas leadership crisis might qualify for charges under RICO statutes. The city and county are protecting each other at the public's expense. In either case we, the taxpayers, are the real victims. If Bolton were a white chief, the statistics alone would be cause for dismissal. Ditto the city manager. Miller is protecting Bolton; Bolton is being used by Price. The public is being used by all of them.
Price insists that a negative article on Bolton is a breach of Price's deal for Bolton to be chief. Whose deal? I didn't get the terms then or now. I certainly didn't agree to it. Hasn't Bolton got the huevos to protect himself? This protection racket is the most cynical treatment of all for minorities in Dallas.
The article only confirms the inherent irony of many minority commentators. "It isn't racism unless a white person says/does it, and regardless of the outcome, minority performance is the racists' fault." Excuse me, but the elephant is still in the room. Price is and has been one of the most blatant racists in Dallas for years and Bolton and the taxpayers his current victims.
John White
Dallas
