[Peace-discuss] From the WCIA Website

[Marti Wilkinson]

In reading the story below I would like to know what kind of resources are
available for the kids who live here?  As a resident of Garden Hills I'm
concerned about what could be a lack of a multifaceted approach here.  Both
the high schools in this community are overcrowded and I believe that this
combined with limited options for kids is a huge factor here.

Champaign's Most Dangerous Address
Reported by: *Dave Benton / WCIA 3 News*

*Monday, Feb 18, 2008 @10:57pm CST*

 They are busy spots for police. But there's one neighborhood where crime is
up and it's getting more serious. This Champaign sargent backing up other
officers with a traffic stop.. on a cold night in february. He questions
those involved.. and one person is put in the back of a squad car. From
here.. it's back to his normal beat.. the garden hills neighborhood.

Sargent Dennis Baltzell heads up the "Cat" team. "If you can built a
relationship with them and they then help you, that's gold." "We were
experiencing a lot of juvenile problems, fighting and large groups of
juveniles, juveniles throwing things at cars, taking over the streets," said
Dep. Chief John Murphy. It all boiled over with a double shooting on hedge
road last may.. so the community assistance team was formed.. to take back
the streets. The same 4 officers handling all the calls. In the last two
years.. there were more than 67-hundred calls to police from the southern
part of the neighborhood alone.. that number is now down.. slightly.

Police, the neighborhood association and other city programs are working
together. Bill Bland "Police have really bonded with the neighbors and areas
adversely impacted, the results have been very positive," said Bill Bland
with the Garden Hills Homeowners Association. Garden Hills isn't the only
neighborhood in Champaign that's had a realatively high number of police
calls, there are others. But this area has raised a red flag most recently.
We're on the North side of town.. here they've gotten 19-hundred calls in
the last two years. "With that call volume, you can't help but notice that
there's some activity," said Murphy. Activity like loud parties..
vandalism.. even a home invasion where the intruder was armed with a gun..
some of the 1,942 calls.. "Traditionally that area had been primarily
business. When you build a residential base in that area, the calls spread
out to 24 hours a day." The city is now evaluating this area.. based on the
same factors used in Garden Hills.. types of calls.. how many and who's
calling.

The solution may be different.. but one thing they've learned from Garden
Hills.. the neigbhorhood must be involved. "We find involving the property
owner early on is when this is most successful." Murphy knows the solution
up North.. won't come overnight.. as it hasn't in Garden Hills. Some here
still worry.. all the trouble makers aren't gone. "I'm just kind of nervous
to see what's going to happen in the summertime because they've been acting
crazy in the winter and summer not even here yet," said Denee Thomas
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