Thread: Marshall Plan to try and save LA

The Los Angeles Times is reporting that a Marshall type plan is needed to bring LA back under control. The city is in such dire straits that they are now comparing it to Europe after World War II.

They tell us how wonderful mass immigration is on one day and the next day they tell us how the city that has received the most immigrants, is about to be overrun by gangs.

It never crosses their mind that there might be a connection. Anyway here is the link and the story.

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me ... -headlines

Los Angeles faces a crisis of gang violence that will continue to spread into previously safe neighborhoods unless the city adopts a Marshall Plan-like initiative to provide young people with jobs and other alternatives in gang-plagued communities, a city-financed study warned Friday.

The report by the Advancement Project called for a significantly greater investment — up to $1 billion during the first 18 months, according to project director Connie Rice — in a comprehensive mix of programs that include gang intervention and prevention and economic development.

Much of that money already may be in the city budget for such programs but not as part of a focused, comprehensive strategy, said Rice, a civil rights attorney.

The report also called for creation of a department of neighborhood safety to be headed by a "high-powered, politically skilled" gang czar to recast and run the city's scattered 23 anti-gang programs that cost $82 million annually.

"After a quarter century of a multibillion-dollar war on gangs, there are six times as many gangs and at least double the number of gang members in the region," the report states.

The $593,000 study was commissioned by the City Council a year ago and contains more than 100 recommendations.

The report calls for the Los Angeles Police Department to get smarter at gang enforcement by focusing more on the most violent of the city's more than 720 gangs, which have more than 39,000 members.

Last week, city officials said that gang crimes, including assaults and robberies, rose 14% last year. Fifty-six percent of the 478 homicides last year were gang-related.

Noting that nearly 75% of youth gang homicides in California occurred in Los Angeles County, the report said the violence would continue to spread without effective countermeasures.

"This epidemic is largely immune to general declines in crime," the report found. "And it is spreading to formerly safe middle class neighborhoods. Law enforcement officials now warn that they are arriving at the end of their ability to contain it to poor minority and immigrant hot zones."

Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa embraced the report's findings in general but did not commit Friday to any specific recommendations.

"Gangs are public enemy No. 1 one in Los Angeles. Gang crime will not be tolerated," the mayor said. "We agree with Connie Rice. We need to develop a comprehensive strategy — one that takes into account prevention, intervention and suppression."

Anticipating the report's findings, the mayor and Police Chief William J. Bratton have said in recent days that they were developing a new strategy for battling gang violence, including a focus on the city's 10 most dangerous gangs.

But Rice's report said the city cannot arrest its way out of the current crisis.

It needs to develop new strategies that go to the root of gang problems, the report said.

"In short, Los Angeles needs a Marshall Plan to end gang violence," the report concludes. "City approaches must address the conditions in neighborhoods and the unmet needs of children that allow gangs to take root, flourish and expand."

In particular, the city needs to provide more child development, job creation, education and public health programs in neighborhoods dominated by gangs, according to the report.

The $1-billion potential cost would include all programs in a comprehensive strategy, including job creation, economic development and after-school intervention programs for at-risk youths, Rice said.

The study identified 12 hot zones of poverty and gang crime. About 300,000 at-risk young people live in neighborhoods with high rates of poverty and/or gang activity, the study found.

The study estimated that a three-year program to get control of the area around Manual Arts High School, for example, would cost about $50 million.

Councilman Tony Cardenas, chairman of the council committee overseeing gang issues, said he supports putting one person in charge of all gang programs, but is not sure what form the office would take.

To pay for the new plan, the study recommends that the city cut back on subsidizing cars for hundreds of employees, unnecessary around-the-clock-staffing of city offices and wasteful overtime.

The study says the city's gang crime costs victims and taxpayers $2 billion a year. It suggests that a research and policy institute be formed to determine whether gang programs are working.

Rice said hers was the third city-commissioned report in two decades to determine why Los Angeles is failing to reduce gang violence.

"And it is the third time that experts have recommended that smarter suppression be linked to comprehensive prevention and intervention and that above all, the city end the conditions that spawn and sustain gangs and neighborhood violence," the report concluded.

The challenge for the city is for its leaders to have the political will to tackle what has become an entrenched problem, the report said.

"In the meantime," the report concluded, "residents of Los Angeles' most dangerous neighborhoods continue losing children to senseless violence, and residents of safe areas are beginning to see that the threat could spread to them."

patrick.mcgreevy@latimes.com

Times staff writer Duke Helfand contributed to this report.

You can see where this will lead. They will run them all out of LA and they will spread out over the entire nation.

Originally Posted by sawdust

You can see where this will lead. They will run them all out of LA and they will spread out over the entire nation.

That is exactly what will happen, another one of those problems they let get way out of hand, seems to be the norm for this country, wait till it is going to cost taxpayers billions and they will still not fix it.
All you can do is learn from places like calif. and try to prevent it in our own towns.

This is what you end up with when you declare yourself to be a "sanctuary city".

Originally Posted by sawdust

You can see where this will lead. They will run them all out of LA and they will spread out over the entire nation.

Tony's gang is probably losing turf to South American rivals. This is a big play for ripping off taxpayers. They'll be requesting federal funds. Get ready for it. Or hey write Congress now. No pesos for illegal alien sanctuaries.

This is a big play for ripping off taxpayers. They'll be requesting federal funds.

I am concerned that we are likely to end up taxed to death with a tax of 60-70% of our income. I just read tonight that Lieberman has proposed a 'tax on terrorism'. It looks like they may be leaning towards a global tax for "global warming'. The country is bankrupt and some states have begun to sell off infastructure and wanting to sell the state lotteries. They are proposing to put the incarceration and health care of illegals on the states with no federal funding to assist. It looks like they are now working on bankrupting the states.

If we don't get rid of these do nothing leaders of ours and start over with people who are really for the best interest of our country and its citizens, we won't have a country left to worry about, simple as that!

"Supply them with JOBS?"

"We don't need no stinkin' jobs! We got American welfare and medical care supplied free to us, paid for by stupid American gringos!"

Loservillelabor writes:

Tony's gang is probably losing turf to South American rivals. This is a big play for ripping off taxpayers. They'll be requesting federal funds. Get ready for it. Or hey write Congress now. No pesos for illegal alien sanctuaries.


I agree. That might be just what is happening now. Their losing control over the situation and now they are crying for help!

The American people owe nothing to illegal aliens!! DEPORT THEM AND SOLVE THE PROBLEM.

Will someone tell me why we should reward gang members with jobs they don't want or they would be working in the first place, instead we need to deport the ones who are illegal and put the ones who are legal to work picking crops in CA!