John T. White Neighborhood Association
How to turn around Meadowbrook
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I just received an email from West Meadowbrook Neighborhood Association regarding recent crimes against the elderly along Martel and throughout our area. Aside from statements regarding being alert and the arrest and release of criminals unfortunately labeled as juveniles did this correspondence offer advice to its recipients? The answer is no. Can't someone command the fortitude to say what should be said? Responsible citizens in our area must act accordingly and report any and all suspicious activity in our neighborhoods. Unfortunately, many property owners fail to act dismissing much behavior and activity by undesirable elements in our area as permissible or the reporting of suspicious behavior as intolerance or the mark of cultural prejudice. Some property owners have just given up thinking that the present situation is beyond their ability to change and that the decline of our neighborhoods is just something which they must accept.
Criminal activity, misdirected young adults, and gang culture are not to be confused with ethnic or cultural expression and values. Crimes committed in our neighborhoods are a result of individuals who choose to conduct their lives with no regard for civility, kindness, and responsible citizenry. Please accept the following considerations.
Call 9-1-1 immediately, if you see any individual who fits the following descriptions:
• teens, young adults, or adults, male or female, walking the streets after sunset
• anyone walking your street wearing baggy pants, sports jerseys, or any clothing or jewelry which could even remotely suggest gang affiliation or street culture
• any individual walking your street that you may not recognize as a neighbor
• any vehicle which can be heard a block away or whose driver displays no respect for posted street signs and posted neighborhood speed
• any vehicle which drives too slowly down your streets as if casing properties
• any individual or group which may be drinking in posted parks or frequenting park areas after sunset
• any residence where frequent nightly traffic comes and goes never staying for more than 10 or 15 minutes
Some properties, often rentals, may exhibit physical signs associated with criminal and undesirable activity. Call or email Code Compliance if you note the following conditions in neighboring properties:
• dilapidated buildings or any property in disrepair
• vacant properties which show any indication of break-in or frequent traffic
• fallen fences or fences in disrepair
• property owners which allow illegal parking of vehicles in yards
• properties where trash is improperly stored or kept in yard or on porches
• properties whose yards are not maintained
Code Compliance issues may be reported at http://fortworthgov.org/codecompliance/info/default.aspx?id=4812 or call 817.831.3093
Report all dogs, especially pitbulls, which are tied, chained, poorly maintained, or running feral. These animals are typically an indication of gang affiliation, ignorance, and street machismo. These animals and their owners are also the cause of most of our feral dog population which is a burden on Animal Control and a nuisance to neighborhood property owners.
Also, those individuals seriously concerned with what is really going on in their neighborhoods can contact their local FWPD precinct location and request crime reports which will provide every police call, reason for call, and property addresses. Names are not listed, but you can through this public information know what is going on in your neighborhood.
Keeping aware of these things has really helped make a difference in my immediate neighborhood but to change the direction of the Meadowbrook area we need a lot more folks watching, questioning, and reporting all undesirable behavior and individuals.
Yours truly,
Jan Lansing Cermak
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I'm very sorry to tell you this, but I saw this similar decline happen to the Polytechnic neighborhood back in the 1970s. When the elderly neighbors started dying off, the surviving family members either sold the homes cheap just to get rid of them quickly or sold them to property management companies who turned them into rental properties. The rental properties then were occupied by families who didn't give a sh** about keeping up the lawn or the house in good condition, parked cars in the yards, generally were the type of people who tended toward criminal activity, you know the type as well as I do. The 'white flight' into the suburbs in Poly during the 1970s was incontrovertible evidence of this phenomenon.
A neighborhood with a high percentage of rental properties, particularly those owned by 'silent' landlords or landlords who reside in other states, in my opinion, contributes more to the decline of a middle class neighborhood into a slum than any other factor.
Anybody who thinks that they can move to another neighborhood and escape this phenomenon has got another think coming. If you live in a neighborhood long enough, the older people will die off and the rental properties will take over the neighborhood and the criminal and otherwise undesirable element will take over the area, whether you like it or not. All you have to do is go to North Richland Hills and see what's happened there. In the 1970s, everybody in Poly thought that area would never decline, but look what's happened there, the area has aged forty years and time has taken its toll.
The suburbs aren't immune to this phenomenon, either. With the skyrocketing rate of foreclosures due to the excessively permissive lending practices of the late 2000s, the banks are likely to turn foreclosed properties into rentals as well. |
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Call 9-1-1 immediately, if you see any individual who fits the following descriptions:
• teens, young adults, or adults, male or female, walking the streets after sunset
• anyone walking your street wearing baggy pants, sports jerseys, or any clothing or jewelry which could even remotely suggest gang affiliation or street culture
• any individual walking your street that you may not recognize as a neighbor
• any vehicle which can be heard a block away or whose driver displays no respect for posted street signs and posted neighborhood speed
• any vehicle which drives too slowly down your streets as if casing properties
• any individual or group which may be drinking in posted parks or frequenting park areas after sunset
• any residence where frequent nightly traffic comes and goes never staying for more than 10 or 15 minutes
CALL (817) 335-4222 NOT 9-1-1 for these complaints. 9-1-1 is for EMERGENCIES ONLY. (817) 335-4222 is the regular Fort Worth Police Department telephone number. 9-1-1 is not for routine and frivolous complaints like those described above. 9-1-1 is intended for life-threatening emergencies. Sports jerseys, by the way, are not automatic signs of gang affiliation. Anybody has the right to walk the streets after sunset, especially if they want to exercise in the summer to avoid the heat. This does not imply that they are criminals. A vehicle driving slowly down a street may be a visitor who is trying to find a house they are visiting for the first time; they are not necessarily a suspicious or criminal person.
Some of the activity you are describing is legitimate criminal or unsavory behavior. However, some of the behavior you are describing is not, and seems to indicate paranoia or perhaps even a bit of racism on your part.
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