NO HUGS FOR THUGS

What Police Did This Week Downtown Was More Than Public Relations

By IAN ROBINSON

The great New York City journalist Jimmy Breslin was assigned to
cover the funeral of President John F. Kennedy.

While every other reporter was following the funeral procession and
getting the identical story, Breslin was at Arlington National
Cemetery ... interviewing the Irish-American gravedigger who'd dug
Kennedy's grave.

In that great newspaper columnist tradition of finding the angle that
wouldn't occur to anybody else, my colleague Rick Bell went out with
the cops on Operation Riverwalk, the much-ballyhooed response of the
Calgary Police Force to our recent crime wave. (Yeah, I know it's
technically called a "Service." The minute they throw away their
pistols and stick daisies in their holsters I'll call them a
"Service" instead of a "Force.")

They were out to kick ass and take names, and they came back with a
bunch of arrests and found a number of miscreants with warrants
outstanding against them.

While Rick talked to the cops, he also interviewed one of the
homeless guys who lives down by the river, one of the people who
normally doesn't have much of a voice.

Chico was thrilled to see the cops because, as one of society's
poorest and most vulnerable, he's more likely to be a victim of
crime. And he's tired of sharing his living space with a bunch of criminals.

Although I've heard the operation criticized as a mere
public-relations exercise, it is much more than that, and it is
exactly what this city needs.

What this city does not need is more rumination on the roots of
crime. It does not need hugs for thugs.

Talking about instituting social programs to fight crime is like
prescribing Botox for Keith Richards.

Just as nothing is going to restore that face -- which looks like a
contour map of the Badlands on a bad day -- being caring and
compassionate with criminals doesn't help.

We've tried that. For decades. And it doesn't work.

Christ once said the poor are always with us. Well, since that fine
day when Cain rose up in the tall grass and whacked brother Abel with
a rock, so have the scumbags.

This city spent nearly $16 million on the Clean to the Core
initiative to spruce up the downtown and hire 18 extra cops to patrol
it. They should have saved money on hanging baskets and simply hired more cops.

You get rid of the scumbags and the graffiti disappears. You get rid
of the scumbags holding some of the country's most expensive real
estate hostage, and the city won't have to pay to spruce the place
up. Developers and ordinary citizens will do that.

Tough to take pride in your neighbourhood when crack whores ply their
trade in daylight and you can't turn around without stepping on some
hobo sunning himself on the pavement.

What the cops did this week was more than mere public relations. It
ought to be the model for how policing is approached in this city. It
hearkens back to the brainstorm of Jack Maple, the New York City
Transit Police officer who pioneered a system he called "cops on
dots." Where there was crime in the transit system -- everything from
turnstile jumping to murder -- he'd place a red dot on a map. And
when there were lots of dots, he'd throw lots of cops at the spot
with orders to take every crime seriously; to let nothing slide.

He's credited with being one of the masterminds of Rudy Giuliani's
successful campaign to clean up New York City.

The cops know where the drug dealers are. Let's put a cop on those
corners. When the dealers move, move the cop. The cops know where the
hooker strolls are. When a minivan with a kiddie seat in the back
with some suburban dad behind the wheel rolls up to a hooker,
wouldn't it be nice if there was a cop on the corner who could wander
up and grin? Say, "Hi there buddy! How you doing?"

How fast do you think suburban dad would drive back to his own
neighbourhood? It wouldn't even take an arrest.

And when the hookers move ... move the cop.

This isn't rocket surgery. It's effective. It works. And, I suspect
for our cops, it'd be fun.

Because nobody hates success.