After my blog post, Statesman joins the action

Today I woke up to every man’s nightmare: I had been robbed. I walked out into the living room of my house, opened the front door, and there was the evidence right before me. Looking down at the rolled up Idaho Statesman sitting there on my porch I could see the headline, front-page above the fold: “MERIDIAN TAKES A SWING AT THE BOISE HAWKS.”

If you scroll down a bit, you’ll note that I posted on that very subject two days ago. The story stemmed from a public meeting of the Meridian Development Corporation where the Boise Hawks unveiled a survey showing huge public support for a new Hawks Stadium, in Meridian. So why would I allege being robbed by Joe Estrella if this is all public information?

At beer and blog a couple weeks ago, this subject came up between Jess Flynn and I. Jess Flynn represents the MDC and does a bang up job. She mentioned that Meridian and MDC were hoping to attract the Hawks there. I noted that the City of Boise in a design Charette almost three years ago had drawn Hawks Stadium into its 30th street Master Plan. I even pulled the plan up on my iPhone and showed it to Jess.

So - Jess and a couple other people were live tweeting that MDC meeting, and sent links to the Hawks presentation. Here’s one of them from Jess:

So - the 30th Street Master Plan never once came up at the MDC meeting - and Joe Estrella just happened to call the City of Boise about it? Not likely.

It’s especially not likely since according to my search of the Statesman archives, the Statesman has never once covered the 30th Street Master plan.

So I called Joe on it, and I copied his boss. Here’s his explanation:

Chris,

Just wanted you to know that the source for my story was somebody who knows Todd Rahr personally and had spoken to him about the situation.

The 30th Street Plan information came from my conversation with Boise officials who went into great detail, including mentioning that the stadium could be built at another site like the Boise Bench.

And as I’m sure you noticed, my story centered on Meridian’s request for an exclusive arrangement between the two parties in exchange for funding the feasibility study. The sources for that information were an MDC and city official.

I replied to Joe:

Joe: in my view that is a weak explanation for how the story came about. In the first place there is no reason for you to call Boise officials to talk about the Hawks since the Hawks reside on County property in the city of Garden City - you had to have been prompted to call John and ask him specifically about 30th street. Secondly, if you are unaware of the social media conversations that were swirling around this issue for two days that speaks as poorly for you as does the more likely case that you just simply borrowed my analysis and passed it off as your own.

Whatever the case, the Statesman has a long way to go in the social media/new media realm. Your organization simply treats the new social media channels as broadcast channels, and is the ONLY media outlet in the Valley that does so.

I remain unconvinced by Joe’s explanation; I have not yet heard from Vicki Gowler. I think the case is clear. This story emanated from my conversations with Jess Flynn (also recounted on her blog), appeared on my blog two days ago, then magically appeared on the front page of the Statesman.

Who’s in Jail?

The issue of jail overcrowding in the Boise Valley has been in the news again. Canyon County voters have twice now told the law enforcement industry that they don’t want to pay for another jail. That has led to calls to create a new “regional” jail that we could all pay for. Dave Frazier loves this idea; I hate it. Ada County Sheriff Gary Raney also likes this idea since his jail will be full by 2014, he says.

BSU Criminal Justice Professor Mike Blankenship has written that sentencing reform is the way to go. BSU Criminal Justice Prof Bob Marsh is doing the consulting study for the law enforcement industry to determine the feasibility, etc. of the regional jail. We’ve got a regular ding-dong fight going here.

In my mind there’s one real issue - who we are locking up. The answer is damn near everyone. This is foolish. The government is responsible for protecting the safety of our person and our property. That is why we lock up murderers and thieves.

But the law enforcement industry is locking up everybody. In fact, only 12% of those housed in the Canyon County jail have committed either a property crime or a violent crime. The rest are dopers, drunks, and probation violators. The sad reason for this is that there simply isn’t anyone else for the law enforcement industry to lock up.

The fact is that property crimes and violent crimes have been falling for 20 years - and it has little to do with improved police activity. From the FBI’s website, I compiled the following charts to show that the wurl we live in is really quite a safe place, and that there is simply no reason to think that we need to spend MORE incarcerating misdemeanants. That is simply ridiculous. So here’s the crime picture in America:

Folks, we don’t need to spend more on jails. We need to spend less. Economics has long held that governments need to take into account the value of services that the public provides for themselves at their own expense. The number one reason for the decrease in property crimes is deadbolt technology, and the fact that people use them. There is also the “abundance” factor. Things like iPods, VCRs, TV’s, and digital cameras have no street value anymore because they are ubiquitous, and pawn shops don’t take stolen goods. We’ve spent 20 years “hardening the target” by adding security lighting, security systems, pit bulls, guns, and forming neighborhood watch committees. Thus, we need less police protection since we have taken security into our own hands.

If the demand for any other public good had dropped in the way that the demand for police protection had, that public good would be offered less. But for some reason people still believe that they are in mortal danger of being beaten and robbed, even though those fears are almost completely unfounded. Truth is violent crime is very, very rare.

I say NO to a regional jail, or any other new jail because the crime rate does not justify it. In fact - it’s just the opposite. Sentencing reform that would send dopers and drunks through treatment using dollars currently used for incarceration would empty the jails, and we’d be left with HUGE overcapacity. We don’t need another jail now or in 2014. It just makes no sense.

Police Department Revenue Source: Stealing from Poor People

Taking property from poor people without due process of law in order to enrich local police departments. Seems like the sort of thing Barack Obama might have fought to change in his days as a community organizer.

One of the most astute observers of global criminal justice policy, Radley Balko, writes that above missive in a recent blog post on his popular Agitator blog. As it turns out, indeed, the Obama administration supported via friend of the court briefs, the State of Illinois’ seizure of assets from 6 people NOT charged with any crime.

Soon, the U.S. Supreme Court will review the Alvarez v. Smith case in which, as noted, six persons had their property seized - and were never charged with a crime. The facts of the case, as Radley Balko points out, are this:

The six petitioners in Alvarez each had property seized by police who suspected the property had been involved in a drug crime. Three had their cars seized, three had cash taken. None of the six were served with a warrant, none of the six were charged with the crime. All perfectly legal, at least until now.

Under DAFPA (Illinois’ Drug Asset Forfeiture Procedure Act), incredibly, the government can delay for up to 187 days before an aggrieved property owner can get even a preliminary hearing on warrantless seizures of less than $20,000. The three car owners, for example, had to go without their cars for more than a year.

As shocking as that sounds, President Obama’s Justice Department sided with the State of Illinois in the initial court battle. The more conservative U.S. Supreme Court may not feel the same way.

So what are the police departments doing with the assets seized from people who have committed no crime? Selling them, of course, and sticking the proceeds in their budget coffers. In Roseville, Michigan over 4% of the police department budget comes from selling looted assets. In Romulus, Michigan it’s over 11%!

File this under, if you aint angry, you aint paying attention.