Allan Appel
Mustafa Abdush-Shakur & Charmein Kirk
If the cops don’t get drug-dealing-related crime under control in the Hill, Rosette Street’s Mustafa Abdush-Shakur told the people who run his neighborhood and his city, it might not be just neighbors getting shot. Police may, too.
Abdush-Shakur (pictured) issued that dire prophecy Tuesday night during a passionate exchange about the recent uptick of violence in the Hill. It took place in the Hill, at the Howard Street substation.
Hill District Manager Lt. Holly Wasilewski threw a pizza party for 50 neighbors at the substation; it was one of a series of events around the city marking “National Night Out” celebrating police and community partnerships in cities across the country.
Wasilewski with residents Thomasina Shaw and Jennifer Dilauro
Wasilewsi was joined by Assistant Chief Patrick Redding and Mayor John DeStefano for what amounted to a mini town hall meeting: an airing of residents’ anxieties and beefs and a briefing on what the police are doing to combat the shootings that have plagued the Hill neighborhood in the last several months. (Click , here, and here for previous stories on the violence.)
Wasilewski announced progress on some of the recent investigations. “That’s thanks to community involvement,” Wasilewski said. “I know your frustration when you call and don’t hear.” But she emphasized how public calls provided vital intelligence about drug spots and who’s carrying guns.
Redding said that the overall approach to suppression of the latest upturn of crime in the Hill includes motorcycle stops with an aim to look for people with outstanding warrants; undercover investigations; and the presence of lots of officers. He announced that four additional officers are being assigned to the Hill.
“Whatever Holly asks for [in connection with the Hill] she never gets no for an answer. The Hill’s got my attention,” Redding said.
Redding said August would feature saturation policing. “We’re not fooling around.”
“We know how to lock people up,” Mayor DeStefano told the crowd. “But that’s not going to solve it for the Hill.” He said the cops would be relying on aggressive enforcement on the street and wiretaps of drug dealers conducted in concert with state and federal agents. Meanwhile, his administration has been working on “reentry policy,” how to steer the 25 felons who return to New Haven from jail each week to more productive lives. The cops will also use street-level “buy and bust” operations, which acknowledged as only a short-term strategy: “The hot spot just moves.”
Neighbors like Dora Brown added another strategy: people talking to cops and forming block watches. She boasted of the nickname given to her by drug dealers she has confronted for years on Asylum Street: “the bitch with the bat.”
Others neighbors like Abdush-Shakur remained frustrated with the officials’ presentation: “If my kid can tell me who drug dealers are and you got all these police riding through, why [does it remain] in our neighborhood”
“We call you and tell you where the drugs are, and you don’t get ‘em,” said longtime Greenwich Avenue resident Charles Spears.
After several neighbors described the disconcerting fear of hearing the “pop pop” of gunfire often during the day, Charmein Kirk said, “My kids found a gun in the yard. I put it high up on the mantle and waited until the police showed up.” That took two hours, she said.
“No one should have to live with what the Hill goes through. It’s a terrible thing,” DeStefano said.
He called it disconcerting that kids are growing up considering this environment normal. He urged anyone with kids to have them stay in school and graduate so that the violence, often spawned by a frustrated joblessness, doesn’t span generations.
DeStefano said what is “scariest” to him in the recent bad economic news is “the closing of three prisons and elimination of dollars for things like Project MORE.”
Kris Sainsbury, president of the Hill/City Point Neighborhood Action Group, said that amid all the help for the re-entry population, she’d like to see a program for how the law-abiding residents can better interact with the returning felons.
DeStefano suggested the management team come up with two ways quality of life can be improved in the Hill.
“I’m satisfied [with the official response],” Dora Brown said. “But we tend to blow off steam. Our job is to stick with it. Holly is [particularly] great. I have a complaint; she’s right there.”
Not all reviews were positive. “They tell us things to placate us. I don’t how much is going to change,” said Greenwich Avenue’s Angela Hatley.
Abdush-Shakur was equally concerned as he escorted his several kids out of the meeting and home for the evening. “I don’t believe they have the answers,” he said. “They need to bring expertise and pressure they did not bring before.”
Pizza and platitudes. It's a recipe for continued violence and the same old, same old as noted in DeStefano's blaming of the state for the closing of the prisons and cutting funding for a program of dubious worth.
We have bloodshed in the streets and no jobs for our young people or their parents. A vote for DeStefano is a vote to continue that 18 year record.