The meeting

Almost 20 people attended, and only four of those were CPO employees... My friend T. was unable to attend, so I went alone. The organizer was definitely in favor of human-based solutions, presumably so that he can use his organization to funnel the money to whom he wishes. Fortunately, most of the people in attendance seemed to favor more capital-intensive solutions, such as security cameras. A compromise of some sort will probably be reached. Afterwards I went to the bar and ran into my neighbor S., who was out shopping. We had three beers and watched the Cubs pull out a win against the Bonds-less Giants.

Safety in an unsafe neighborhood

There's this neighborhood safety meeting in a couple of hours, which I'll attend with my friend T. Nothing will come of it at all. The meeting is about how to best spend this $75,000 grant from the city. The plan, ostensibly, is to spend it on "safety ambassadors", who will do fuck all for the safety of the neighborhood. What we need is a more prominent police presence, and more incentives for owner-occupancy in the neighborhood. Unfortunately, these plans are not politically appropriate in our neighborhood, since they are likely to offend the sensibilities of the public housing delinquents who make up the bulk of the neighborhood, and upon whose backs the neighborhood social service agencies receive funding. I think we'll go for beers afterwards.