Yesterday I banged out a spirited rant about the local newspaper’s Fargo-favorable rebuttal to KJ’s crime claims. In my diatribe, I pointed my binary pen at the local newspaper, as well as Heather Fargo and the Police Department for dismissing concerns about public safety (Police: “citizens should feel safe”; Fargo: “Citizens should not feel unsafe”; Newspaper: “To hear KJ tell it Sacramento is a violent place”).

Suffice to say, after a good night’s sleep (and a few strong cups of San Francisco’s finest gourmet coffee, to be had for a mere $5.29 a lb at—of all places—Fry’s right now if you’re interested), some begging questions have arisen in my head, and I’d be remiss if I didn’t explore them..

But first, I must acknowledge the now obvious : Sacramentans are split on the severity of the crime problem. Forget the Sac PD and the mayor’s office for a moment; after all, they are stewards of the city’s reputation, and would not concede to a public safety slam—even if there was one—any more than Bill Gates would concede to losing 40% of Microsoft’s Explorer users to Firefox. Not going to happen.

Admittedly, when I initially read the local newspaper’s article (which lined forces up against KJ like an invading Army), my knee-jerk reaction was: WHAT?! LOOK AT THE STATS! LOOK AT THE CRIME LOGS! TALK TO THE VICTIMS! But today.. I’ve got me some questions, and the first one is, “Is it possible KJ’s ambiguous statements about the crime problem (i.e. “Sacramentans tell me they do not feel safe”) have divided the city into two distinct camps: One camp convinced the city is safe, and the other camp convinced it is NOT?

Is it also possible that the Sacramento Police Department’s statement in that article (i.e. “citizens can feel safe”), was not a dismissal of the crime problem, but instead simply a reflexive answer to protect the department’s reputation? Could it be that Johnson’s generalizations backed them into a corner and forced them to disagree with him?

After all, it’s not like the PD would throw a party for Fargo if she got re-elected, right? Let’s face it, had KJ never generalized in the first place; that is, had he stated the crime problem in more explicit terms, the author of the article could have never lobbed the “Should citizens feel safe?” idiotic question to Police or Fargo in the first place! If the article’s author fired the gun, then KJ loaded it for him.

Regardless, the article in question and reader reactions seem to indicate KJ’s generalizations have had the exact opposite effect he intended them to. Where he sought to unite people, it seems he may have divided them even further. He accuses Fargo of being naive (jury’s back: she’s guilty), but yet he has shown a high degree of naivety himself, especially when it comes to—surprise!—consensus building.

But before you get all excited (my Fargo-loving friends), can any reasonable person really condemn KJ for being passionate about public safety? Look where he’s from. Every day he is seeing young people’s lives being cut short. Dreams shattered. Senseless violence. First person narrative. Kevin’s neck of the woods is far bloodier than that of the typical Fargo supporter’s. Believe it.

Being a Natomas resident, I too am also convinced beyond a reasonable doubt that there is a huge crime problem in the city (as my rant demonstrated yesterday). I may not see the type of out-of-control gang violence KJ and my friends in other neighborhoods see, but crime is alive and well where I live in Natomas Park and we have a jam packed log of murder, armed robbery, burglary, rape, and home invasion to prove it. Believe it.

The inconvenient truth is this: There IS a crime problem in parts of the city. 5,129 violent crimes in the books do not lie, my friends. While they may not be in YOUR neighborhood YET, rest assured they will be if something is not done about the problem. No matter how inconvenient that truth is, it can not be ignored if this city is to become the poster child for livable places like we ALL want it to be.

So in that spirit, let’s experiment with semantics a bit for the good of the community, and in honor of every citizen out there who has been the victim of a violent crime, or fears for their safety every night when the sun goes down.. you know.. the people who do not have a blog to express their pain and outrage. Here are a small sampling of questions I would pose to our esteemed mayor and Police Department:

1. “Do you think Hispanic men should feel safe in downtown Sacramento at night in the vicinity where four Hispanic guys have been shot and killed by what appears to be a serial killer?”
2. “Do you think residents in Del Paso Heights should feel safe by themselves walking or riding their bike with the serial stabber on the loose?”
3. “Do you think it is safe for Regency Park residents to keep their garages open during the day after a bicycle riding nutjob has robbed several of them at gunpoint, and even shot one man in the buttocks as he tried to run into his home?”

Of course I could go on and on. Anyone could. Oops, there I go generalizing again. Violence is prevalent in many of our neighborhoods. The point here is: NO MATTER WHO YOU END UP VOTING FOR, do not let the city downplay the crime problem. If you are as passionate about public safety as I am, if you see it as important to the growth of the community as electricity and water as I do, then join me in asking the city explicit questions they simply can not ignore.

At the end of the day, regardless of how the communication stemming from this election has probably DIVIDED us more than we were divided before it started (and Local 447 and the GENUINE smear blogs, you can take a bow because you brought great shame on this city), we all live here and we all want Sacramento to be a desirable place to live, work, and raise a family. And I don’t know about you, but I believe we need to be UNITED to do that, not divided. Lest we not forget this startling excerpt from Daniel Weintraub’s article about skyrocketing crime in Sacramento:

“[statistics show] a person is just as likely to be killed on the streets of Sacramento as in Los Angeles, and far more likely to be raped or robbed in Sacramento…”

It is high time Sacramento residents start coming together instead of drifting apart further. To that end, I hope dialog remains robust, and generalizations minimal.

No matter how all this plays out, I’m glad we’re finally talking about crime.