The much-touted Nikiski Community-Against Crime meeting on Wednesday night left me angry and frustrated. On the one hand the outpouring of community support was gratifying. On the other, the same non-solutions to Nikiski’s crime problem were familiar and short of any positive answers.
I won’t recount the numerous talking heads who offered haggard and well-worn “solutions.” We’ve heard them before. Wednesday night’s meeting reiterated the long list that promised nothing and only served to provoke the growing frustration among residents in our community. Bottom line: our elected representatives care little, if nothing, about Nikiski’s crime wave and the Troopers excused themselves because of limited resources.
What was absent was a call for really meaningful involvement by the men and women of Nikiski. The first speaker warned that “there’ll be no talk of vigilantism” which served only to put the whole problem in the hands of the State Troopers and politicians, who with thread-worn rhetoric, told the crowded auditorium not to expect much since meager resources prevented active law-enforcement action. Our state representative was there to excuse his failure and to quickly blame others. The excuses became tedious. One after one, the attendees told their sad stories, all being the victims of criminal activity here on the North Road. They waited for answers that didn’t come.
What we didn’t hear were the words of men and women who know how to “take care of business.” The only problem is that the State Troopers will not allow the good people of Nikiski to take care of business themselves. The people of Nikiski are unwilling to be victimized thrice: Once by the ineffective coverage by the State Troopers; again by the District Attorney and the gutless judges who retreat from the idea of punishment in favor of “rehabilitation,” plea bargains, and slap-on-the-wrist sentences; and third, from the threat that any action taken by We The People will result in our own arrest!
It’s time to banish from our midst the druggies, the thieves, and other low-life hoodlums. The means are available, but the Troopers and PC folks in our own community won’t turn a blind eye, trusting instead the established, yet failed, business-as-usual trust in others to protect us! It’s time we protected ourselves.
Last night, the Troopers acknowledged their inability to help. So too, the politicians and Crime Stop program folks. Therefore, all in all, we are no further along than we were.