This is AM with your CC ( click to listen)
Well we were on the brink of a major accomplishment. Almost made it to a whole three years without a window broken at the store! But then an urban outdoorsman decided our winning streak would need to come to an end. ( long rap sheet with this guy, local news hound Chiv has been tracking this guy for a long time!)
He is on the surveillance camera, calmly walking by around 11am. He is carrying a couple bags. He sets them down. He was also carrying a stick. He purposely walks over and with a mighty baseball swing took out a window.
When confronted he basically said he doesn't like us. Well isn't that just special. Damages done by yet another of Eureka's Criminal Drug Addicts.
There are hundreds of stories like this. And they are unique to Eureka. No, the homeless issue is not the same everywhere. Criminal Drug Addicts are so emboldened to do as they please. for many years Eureka has valued their bums more than their businesses. The years go by and more businesses close, but the number of homeless seems to be increasing.
Our police are the only positive piece of this puzzle as they have fine tuned their approach continuing to make solid breakthroughs as they consistently prevent homeless encampments from planting roots and focusing on the worst offenders.
Even now the city council is getting around to upgrading criminal drug addict behavior from an infraction to a misdemeanor. The local news covers it and pretends that it means something. But not so fast with that. Even worse, the council decided to kick the decision down the road, hoping for some kind of brilliant breakthrough which you and I know ain't going to come to them.
Your occasional reminder that the term homeless actually includes three distinctly different groups. The smallest are those down on their luck, at less than 10 percent. Followed by the mentally ill which studies put at 20% and the remaining homeless in Eureka are the incredibly destructive, Criminal Drug Addicts. Each of these three groups need different mitigation strategies, yet we continue to bull headedly declare they all deserve housing and perks and the predictable messy cycle continues.
Regarding the criminal drug addict chaos, If the hundreds of eye witness stories are not enough, then you can always go to travel forums like Trip Advisor and see all the genuine warnings about how dangerous Eureka is to visit.
But maybe stories and reviews are still not enough for you, well there's also the data. Numerous lists with catchy titles online like "top 10 most dangerous cities" place eureka as a top crime spot. Thankfully it's not for violent crime but our ratio for property crime blows most places away. Just more proof that the criminal element here is unique different than other parts of the country.
We can all get involved. If you are a resident, get good fences, a gate and cameras. Get a guard dog
If you are a community nonprofit, make sure that you are helping the homeless that actually intend to reintegrate in society and stop pampering the majority that are just looking for their next fix.
If you have a business, consider buying my E book on Amazon it's called the Merchant Defense Course and it's priced nice and low just to pay for itself, not to make a fortune. It's one way I can pass some effective techniques on to other business owners suffering the same problem I am. I welcome any and all of your feedback, the typos are included for no extra charge.
As it stands now it's not looking good for the cities future. We still don't have a functional ordinance to keep criminal drug addicts moving, even still allowing the disastrous needle sharing programs to continue and the property crime stats are making their mark--one window at a time