The large majority of the city of Duluth citizens seem to be oblivious and unconcerned about the events taking place in their city.
I am not writing about the protesting events that draw attention to police officers actions or Black Lives Matter issues.
I am writing about what happens when our city leaders, supposedly led by Emily Larson, our mayor; and Police Chief, Mike Tuscan, do not take strong public stances regarding destruction of property and defilement of public streets with needles, clothing and general litter. The Kozy Bar, which has been boarded up, is being broken into, the plywood boards are loosened in places to allow people to enter and use the property for their own reasons
and the city’s law enforcement agency does not prevent this from happening. The properties ownership may still be in limbo but there was some legal action to give the city the right to determine its future.
The government has determined that panhandling is a right, we have placed porti-potties in public areas to encourage people to use them and have generally turned a blind eye to behaviors that ten to twenty years ago would have appalled the general public. Are we turning into a third world, poverty driven society?
It would seem that by trying to help those who do not want to or cannot help themselves, (except when they want to do something illegal, like buy drugs or break into property or have verbal and/or physical fights on the street) we are moving in that direction.
There are some ideas that have worked in the past to help large groups of people to accomplish good things AND improve self-esteem of the individuals by defunding social services and establishing CCA type camps.
Defunding and demeaning police officers is not the answer. Electing leaders who WILL PROVIDE TRUE LEADERSHIP is.