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"Uptown: Chicago's Most Entertaining Neighborhood"
We've been sitting on our hands the past few days, trying to resist calling/emailing/texting/sending passenger pigeons to Ald. Helen Shiller's 46th Ward office (again) for an answer to the weeks-old question "what, exactly, is going on in Uptown?" She finally posted a press release yesterday, which we've been reading... and rereading... for substance all day. It's lacking. But it does finally address the Aug. 13 Uptown Riot.
An altercation broke out between a couple dozen young men at the intersection of Sheridan and Leland in Uptown. There were no guns or knives used, but bottles were thrown and there was yelling and attempted fisticuffs. Most of the event was videoed by a neighbor.Within minutes of receiving the 911 call, officers arrived and the youth dispersed. There was one arrest, one police officer suffered a minor injury and there was a little property damage. No one else in the area suffered any injuries. Because of the subsequent media frenzy, this incident has come to symbolize safety in Uptown. In general, the recent discussion about crime and violence in our community has been emotional, high-pitched and polarizing.
We have our own ideas about Uptown's troubles: overzealous tax increment financing for Wilson Yard, have coupled with the troubled real estate market to reduced property tax income for the ward; meanwhile acts of violence in the 46th Ward have been much more visible - and much harder to corral, if the recent, widely-circulated online videos are to be believed.
However, in running the numbers for the 46th Ward to see how badly Shiller was doing this year, we were surprised to discover that Uptown was in keeping with the citywide trend - crime was down in her ward, compared to last year. According to EveryBlock.com, for the time period around the riot, (Aug. 1-19), police reports of violent crime - burglary, robbery, assault and battery - have actually dropped by more than 28 percent. The data suggests there were 101 violent crimes last year - and 72 this year. This puts Uptown below even its 2007 statistics.
That said, Shiller's response to her angry constituents was a non-confrontational post on her website yesterday afternoon. Shiller wrote that the Aug. 13 near-riot has brought the frenzied attention of the media to her ward - and that she spends more time, "and resource fighting crime and violence than dealing with any other issue." Whether or not that's true isn't something that we can prove without actually talking to the alderman - and analyzing the way she budgets her time, but if the statistics are to be believed, crime is actually down in Uptown.
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"Chicago's most entertaining neighborhood!"
THE IRONY!
I love it so much. XD
Crime is not down, just the number of people being charged. Just because nobody is arrested doesn't mean the crime didn't take place. The city is having a blast manipulating those statistics for the benefit of the Olympic committee and others.
Exactly. When shots are fired (which is often a nightly occurrence in Uptown), unless somebody is actually injured or property damage is reported, it doesn't figure into crime statistics. And that's how you spin crime and violence in Uptown/Chicago...
I hear ya, Pinko. I'm on Magnolia where the fun never ends.
I doubt crime is down. Politicians and police have been manipulating crime stats for decades. Look at some of the novels of Joseph Wambaugh for examples.
At the moment the CPD is undermanned. If you call 911 you may not get a quick response. Do you sit there for 45 minutes waiting for a cop to show up or do you wait 40 get frustrated and walk away? Therefore, no crime stat.
Now I don't want to play Chicken Little. I do believe that generally over the past decades crime has gone down in Uptown. The alderman has played little or no role in that phenomena. It's just like her talking about the new streetlights in the ward. Other wards don't get streetlights?
If people want some other views on that letter I suggest they check out http://www.uptownupdate.com/
We must not assume everything that comes out of Helen's mouth is true. Do your research. A very savy blogger on Uptown Update summed it up quite well:
"Helen's Uptown is divided between two police districts. For example, a few weeks ago I looked at aggravated batteries in the 23rd district. All of them occurred in Helen's part of the district. So, in order to get the best picture of what people are talking about you need to look at the central area of her ward where the most crime occurs. What is happening there? Every police district has its hot spots, but how are her hot spots faring against wards with similar demographics?
As for the ward-by-ward comparisons, the 48th ward which surrounds her own home ranks 48th in index crimes and 49 for all crimes. Helen's ward ranks more than ten points higher (39th) for violent crimes and 37th for all crimes. Yet the 48th ward also contains mental health facilities, low income housing and an economically and ethnically diverse population. I could check the median income for the two wards but I would suspect that they are similar on most accounts.
It begs the question, what is different between the 46th ward and its surrounding wards? Its not fair to compare the 46th ward to all of Chicago. A more accurate comparison would be with similarly diverse neighborhoods."
Crime has trended down for the entire city since the early nineties. The murder rate is about half what it was when I first moved here. While I feel for Uptown residents I find some of the downright *hysterical* responses amusing, especially as somebody who's lived most of my Chicago years in Humboldt Park.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Chicago_violent_crime_map_2006.png
I grew up visiting my grandparents right down the block from there. leland was always a shady block in uptown. if crime was going to happen, it was likely to be on leland.
but if crime overall is down in uptown then that's still an improvement. jeez compared to the uptown of the 80's and 90's that i knew, it's a much better place. of course i can understand that people want things to be better though.
anyways, it sounds like shiller needs to grow a pair instead of this delayed online response. 2 weeks after the fact?? come on.
I think it's a perception thing. No matter what the stats are, some 46th Ward residents feel more afraid because of the video, and many feel that Ald. Shiller is willfully unresponsive to negative criticism.
Both I (on my Chicagosphere blog) and the Rogers Park Bench blog wrote simultaneous, independent (we didn't know we were on the same track until after we were both done), and frank line-by-line analyses of Shiller's rather lame response statement from yesterday. If you are interested, find them here:
Chicagosphere Analysis of Shiller's Statement
Rogers Park Bench Analysis of Shiller's Statement
EveryBlock? Oh, please.
Here's what the melee looked like on EveryBlock.
You'd never know an all-out melee took place, with dozens of guys, some with golf clubs, chucking bottles and completely disregarding bystanders and even the first cop car to respond.
Crime is "down" because fewer police are observing it and responding to it. This "altercation" (to use Shiller's word) resulted in one crime and one arrest.
Perception matters as any politician should bloody well know. If the perception is that Uptown is dangerous, business won't move there (the lone beachhead that is Borders), the tax base won't increase, the area starts to suffer economically and it just gets worse.
Blaming the media for covering something awful and visual and appalling is kind of ridiculous.
I have friends in Uptown. It's not a hellhole and it's not perfectly safe. It's the city. Crime happens. I moved to Roger Park out of college, lived there for three years, had nothing but nice experiences with my neighbors and the area. All the noisy racists in my family said I was going to get killed and eaten or something.
I moved to Wicker Park and was robbed at gun point a week later. By a white dude.
Your mileage may vary but panic helps nothing.
jess nevins - by the way, the Borders you mention is in Uptown, but that's in Mary Ann Smith's ward. Shiller and her peeps protested that development before it went in.
Take a look at the ward maps for the 46th Ward (Shiller) and the 48th Ward (Smith). Its interesting to see that you can literally cross the street in the 46th Ward, enter the 48th, and it looks 10 times better.
The best way to do this is drive north on Broadway. When you get to Leland (the ward cutoff) you enter Smith's ward and magically see cleaner streets, Borders, Agami, Crew, Green Mill, etc... South of Leland (Shiller's) is really struggling and pretty filthy.
Thanks for the heads up. Reading the Aldermanic maps is a study in pure madness.
I've noticed that cut off too. My friends live off Wilson, on Malden, and the area is really strange. You have pop-ups of development all along wilson, but as you get closer to Broadway it starts to look more like 70's New York or something.
It's interesting to me how many condo developments up there stalled out last year when the econoclasm happened. The prices keep edging down. If the economy comes popping back, you could see a bit of a land rush on the cheap developments.
Ald. Shiller is correct that the 23rd Police District is one of the safest in the City. What she doesn't mention is that the 23rd Police District is within 3 primary neighborhoods: Lincoln Park, Lakeview, and Uptown. There continues to be a disproportionate amount of crime in some spots in Uptown. If you review crime by each census tract, this particular tract falls within the 95th percentile in the number of drug arrests. It's these hotspots that need the attention of residents, businesses, social services, school, police, and our elected representatives.
In her note to her constituents this last Thursday, Ald. Shiller made the claim that challengers who have run against her in the past (I ran against her in 2007 in a very close election) equate affordable housing with crime. Nothing could be further from the truth. Affordable housing is sorely needed all over Chicago, Cook County, and Illinois. I want affordable housing that meets best practice guidelines in their design, placement, and management. That's where Ald. Shiller and I differ.
That said, all residents want and deserve to feel safe in their own neighborhood regardless of their income level. To suggest that I am against affordable housing serves to frighten many neighborhood residents and ultimately divides and further polarizes an already polarized community.
Going forward, I would encourage Ald. Shiller to start participating in CAPS and work with the community to make the area safer. It would have been helpful on her part to have attended the positive loitering event we had last night at 11pm. People of all races and economic backgrounds attended the event. Again, it was a missed opportunity to show support to the community that needs leadership.
It would have been helpful on [Shiller's] part to have attended the positive loitering event we had last night at 11pm. People of all races and economic backgrounds attended the event. Again, it was a missed opportunity to show support to the community that needs leadership.
Why exactly would you expect her to show up at one of your events when your supporters shouted her down and chased her out of that event at Truman College? And those little demonstrations of yours look fairly monochromatic when I do by!