When I grew up we were the All 'American City, the phrase most heard now is no ongoing threat to the public. Mr. Mayor, Mr. Police Chief, actually there is an ongoing threat to the public when people keep getting shot!!!
I know that going on vote pandering diversity trips to the Caribbean isn't going to help. I know that funding former criminals to march around in orange shirts isn't going to help.
While the Morning Call doesn't report Saturday shootings until Monday, news spreads fast in the hood. While the Strata Apartments can put out advertisements about food courts, the food and museum isn't worth being accidentally shot for.
Until we get a much bigger police force, you have to flood this city with State Police, and start taking these bad actors off the streets and out of the alleys.
artwork by Allentown native Mark Beyer
ADDENDUM:The Promise Neighborhoods Peace Walk on Saturday ended at the 7th Street parking lot, where six people were shot the previous Sunday. Joining the walk were council president Cynthia Mota and Mayor Matt Tuerk. Mota had nominated Hasshan Batts for mayor when Pawlowski was carted off. Tuerk had started his mayoral term with a trip to the Dominican Republic to learn about their culture. An hour later and three blocks farther after the walk ended Saturday, there was another shooting at 8th & Union Streets. Mota and Tuerk apparently don't know the difference between orange and blue. Don't expect the public safety dilemma to improve under their leadership.
I've said it before, but it bears repeating: Allentown - rolling downhill like a snowball heades for hell.
ReplyDeleteThe nuts are running the asylum and live in some sort of cyber solution that is incomprehensible to us normies!
ReplyDeleteIt really has come to a point where people, families, weigh the risk of coming downtown with the reward. I actually decided NOT to do a family outing to the Art Museum Saturday due to the risk. Sad, but true.
ReplyDeleteI do not normally consider downtown ever risky, except the festivals are an unnecessary concentration of emotion. Tuerk will destroy the city if he persists with the pandering.
DeleteMichael, I happened to cruise down Hamilton Street late Saturday night… approximately 10:00 PM. The sports bar at 7th & Hamilton appeared to be very busy and a happening place. I turned right onto 7th street and noticed a group of younger people in the lobby of the apartments behind the old Merchants Bank building with their dogs, either returning or waiting to go for a walk. The rest of the downtown appeared to be (I hate to say it) DEAD!!!
ReplyDeleteIt would be interesting to know/hear what the actual impact these shootings have on the residence of the Reillyville Apartments.
Perhaps they don’t feel it impacts them directly.
My guess is that the person that lives in Orefield, Macungie, Coopersburg, or Cetronia might have second thoughts about coming to downtown Allentown for the afternoon or evening. The people that live in downtown Allentown don’t seem to be as concerned or intimidated by the violence.
Just an observation.
The mayor is simply out of his element and does not know how ro generate solutions. He only knows the pandering and self destructive woke response. Broken glass policing, shutting down the money train to leaching non-profits, and demanding that the Allentown citizenry call out and humiliate those in their neighborhoods who celebrate anti-social conduct is a start.
ReplyDeleteI find that the current mayor has an amazing lack of attention to detail. As I drive around the city, I can see graffiti, gang tags, people operating illegal auto repair shops on city streets (every day), litter and many other problems. I can also hear music blaring all day from various residences, and often am serenaded with fireworks at night.
ReplyDeleteI’m assuming the mayor actually lives in the city, yet he apparently sees and hears none of this. It could be that he’s genuinely clueless, but I think it’s more likely that he’s actively ignoring the problems out of some sort of misguided thinking.
Either way, you can’t fix the problems that you refuse to see. While he might think he’s being culturally sensitive, he’s actually fostering the rot that’s causing the shootings in the city.
I’d like to believe that it’s still possible for him to see the obvious, but we’re almost three years into his term and things are getting worse. There is certainly no indication that he is going to change anything.
I can only hope there are good candidates with common sense out there who will be ready to challenge him in next year’s primary election. That election is right around the corner, and those candidates need to be developing their funding and voter outreach networks NOW.
I believe that Tuerk would be very hard, if not impossible to beat in the primary. An opponent would be better served running as a Republican, and be on the ballot in November of 2025.
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