If you missed yesterday's interview on Nookular Option you can download the podcast here. Joe covers various topics both related to the campaign as well as some state issues and you can hear me ask Joe a question and then blather on about how much I love Toledo...
This Press Release from the Joe McNamara for City Council campaign came out this morning:
Joe McNamara is “Fighting Crime At Its Roots” City council candidate plants fruit trees with supporters and introduces initiative to promote safer neighborhoods through community gardens.
Toledo, OH – Joe McNamara will hold a press conference and lead a service project at the Glenwood Lutheran Church community garden next door to the Church (2545 Monroe) today, Wednesday, July 19, at 2 PM.
The candidate and supporters will plant a few bushes and fruit trees and McNamara will announce “Fighting Crime At Its Roots,” his plan to promote safer neighborhoods through community gardens.
“You might not recognize it at first glance but community gardens like this one are powerful and cost-effective weapons in our crime-fighting arsenal,” McNamara asserts. “Cutting edge research tells us that a strong sense of community is a neighborhood’s best defense against delinquency and crime.”
McNamara’s proposal calls for establishing a task force to determine what city government can do to promote community gardening, for an inventory of city-owned vacant lots suitable for community use, and for extending the city’s Youth Park Ranger program into neighborhood gardens.
“By fighting crime at its roots with initiatives like this we save taxpayers money, enrich the lives of community residents and children, and add value to our neighborhoods,” says McNamara.
“Service to ALL of Toledo” is the theme of McNamara’s grassroots campaign. In addition to having a legacy of public service in his family, McNamara currently gives back to his community as a Trustee of the Toledo-Lucas County Public Library system and a Board Member of the Greater Toledo Urban League.
Since announcing his candidacy last month, McNamara and supporters have walked in the American Cancer Society’s Relay for Life, participated in the Greater Toledo Urban League’s Day of Service in the neighborhood surrounding the Frederick Douglas Center and registered voters at the Toledo broadcast of radio host Tom Joyner’s Sky Show. Most recently he organized a blood drive at the American Red Cross Donation Center in Toledo last Saturday.
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8 comments:
"Safer neighborhoods through community gardens." Is this Opal Covey's replacement? Or is this nonsense supposed to be taken seriously?
It may sound like "nonsense" but there is actually quite a bit of research as well as other communities that have done this and it's worked. A few examples:
Manchester, New Haven and there are several research papers out there that suggest this as well as this article references and this one.
Several studies nationwide suggest that gardens and green space might help to lower crime rates. In San Francisco's Mission District, the Trust for Public Land reported a 28 percent drop after a garden led to the formation of a neighborhood watch group. In Chicago, professors Frances Kuo and William Sullivan compared crime rates among 98 apartment buildings in a public housing project. They found buildings with high levels of vegetation had 52 percent fewer crimes than buildings with low levels.
"fighting crime" is such a political buzz word. The tree idea is interesting but drug dealers/users don't care much about horticulture other than cannibis and Papaver somniferum.
“Service to ALL of Toledo” Does this infer that the other 3 candidates do not serve ALL of Toledo?
How would a 28 year-old have more connections to the community and to a 'legacy of public service' than the two 50 year-old candidates, Santiago and Vasquez?
Come on, Joe, these are cheap shots and they will backfire on you if you press the issue. Your campaign manager needs to get more realistic with you. Someone of you age cannot go toe to toe with folks twice as old as you who have lived and served in the city their whole lives.
You can tell I wasn't feeling well when I made the comment above and I'm sorry for the tone. I've also met Opal Covey and, though points of agreement may be limited, she's a very nice lady. All that said, I can support community gardens as a very good idea but, as a crime fighting tool, it's useless. The claims made by these studies tend to get ahead of the evidence.
Jeffrey, that's okay. I have my less than stellar days where I write something that I didn't mean quite as it turned out too.
I think the garden concept can be an encouragement to the process that makes a neighborhood have less crime. I haven't done scads of research though, but what I have read does indicate it helps.
Joe, you are welcome and thank you for commenting. I hope your event went well today and I look forward to hearing more of your ideas in the future.
:-)
Even if it doesn't help the crime rate, there are a lot of other reasons. Anything that gets people in contact with real earth, not asphalt, is fine with me.
The theme of my campaign is “Service to ALL of Toledo” because I wanted to communicate that I’m running for City Council to be a public servant, not to divide people along party and faction lines.
Vague reference. "ALL" doesn't specify this reference in your statement above, "not to divide people along party and faction lines."
Just trying to help keep you on track, Joe.
It's nice to see the younger candidates coming out to run for local offices.
Maybe there's still some hope...
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