marianne said:
I'm so sad to hear they are not increasing public safety along with all the new development. When the Waldorf ballfield project was being introduced to the public I wrote a letter to the county saying that the ballfield will be a great addition provided that it will be protected well. But if it goes the way of the St Charles mall, most families will stay away from the ballfield and eventually move out of the county.
I was impressed to see that they were putting a police station inside the St Charles mall. Hopefully more police presence will improve that area. But I think the biggest problem may be priorities. My stomach churns when I see speed traps on our country roads. While I acknowledge speeding may be an issue, it's not nearly as bad as the violent crimes happening elsewhere. And it really troubling when you hear that the speed traps are set up during rush hour to "catch the commuters". Like it's the commuters causing the big crimes in the county. I'd like to think the police force is using those tickets to pay for increased presence in the violent crime areas but that may be just wishful thinking.
I agree with you that without added public safety measures, any attraction be it a ballfield, shopping center, theater, etc. will be useless to county residents especially those with kids. I think that we are almost at a point where there will be no turning back. Once the scales of good vs bad are tipped too far I don't think you can get back to where you were. I have lived in Charles County for quite a few years and I remember when there was no mall, ice rink, no nothing really. I remember when about 4 cops could patrol the entire county. Unfortunately times have changed drastically. I honestly don't see it getting much better. While the fault lies in many places, I think the biggest mistake was allowing the residential/commercial growth of the county at a rate that didn't allow public service police/fire/ems resources to keep up. There should have been caps put on both residential and commercial construction. I had hoped that the new commissioners would be more concerned with the growth or should I say outgrowth of the county, but apparently they are only concerned with the new ballfield and other frivilous ways to use our taxes.
As for the radar. I think the county gets a whopping $1 per ticket. So they generate very little revenue from ticket writing. I think the state gets the rest. I do think that while radar is annoying to those of us going to and from work, too many people are dying on our roads every year and it is getting worse. With parents buying kids faster and faster cars and kids getting more and more immature with regards to their immortlity the only choice we have is radar traps to catch them. I have seen more radar set up since Sheriff Coffey has been in office then during Sheriff Davis' entire tenure. And with speeding the bottom line is if you aren't speeding you won't get a ticket. So I guess what I am trying to say is yes they do need enough resources to keep violent crime down but at the same time you have to consider that more people died or were injured in automobile accidents than in all violent crimes within the county last year.
We can hope for best but I think in the end it will come down to moving out of the county. That or learning to deal with the crime rate skyrocketing.
