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Permalink Reply by John Boutet on January 29, 2010 at 5:59pm

Hi Margy, I attended the meeting. It was lightly attended with about 14 people counting presenters. This was the first combined 19thWCA Public Safety/Thurston St. Watch meeting. They will run sequentially this way from now on with the Public Safety meeting starting at 6:30 pm then Adams Meeting will start roughly 45 minutes later. They were shooting for ending at 8 PM. They will all be at the Presbyterian Home. I did not really see much progress. There was some discussion about what location to move the bus shelter to. The sidewalk in front of the old 7-Eleven seemed the preferred location if a new market can come in there. Having it within sight of a camera was considered important as was keeping visibility-obscuring-adds off the glass in the shelter.

Adams negotiations with the powers-that-be in City Hall have been slowed by an inappropriate squabble between two city council members and some people from the mayors staff. The mayor was vexed and now requests for discussions between all council members and the mayor's staff have to be submitted in writing to the mayor and be approved before they can talk.

CPO Runyon and Lt. Dearcop were there and went over crime stats a bit and talked about the discussions they had had with the RTS about bus stop shelters. There was some discussion about starting "block clubs". Kristin Runyon made a good point that it is best to start a block club to do things that are fun rather than wait for a problem to get people together. If clubs are formed only to solve a problem they fall apart when the problem is gone.

Since the 19thWCA Public Safety meeting and the Thurston St. Watch meeting involve a lot of the same issues, in reality, we bounced back and forth between the two. People who are interested in being part of the Thurston St. Watch meeting really should show up for the 6:30 start of the 19thWCA Public Safety meeting so that half of what gets said at the first meeting does not need to be repeated for the second meeting. Since these are mostly group discussions, the same energy just does not go into the rehash when we need to re-cover the same issue for the second meeting.

That's all that comes to mind Margy.
John

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Permalink Reply by Margy Meath on January 30, 2010 at 10:44am

Thank you for the update John.
i am disappointed, yet not completely surprised, to hear the lack of progress with this initiative. I imagine that the low attendance is likely due to lack of communication re: this meeting and/or people not wanting to waste time attending meetings where there seems to be nothing happening.
Can you add some more detail to your 2nd paragraph re: the Mayor, City Council and what people are squabbling about?

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Permalink Reply by John Boutet on January 31, 2010 at 1:58pm

We did not get much detail. I suspect two council members who did not appreciate what the chain of command is tried to give orders to staff that report to the mayor and got into an argument with the staff members. Apparently a similar dispute and mayoral reaction happened in the Johnson administration. Hopefully things will get back to a more respectful, cooperative and productive mode once everyone is comfortable what the boundaries are between the mayor's turf and the city council's turf.

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Permalink Reply by Shawn on January 30, 2010 at 1:32pm

I was semi aware that the two meetings were going to be combined. I do not remember where I heard about it. Probably here on Location19, but I'm not sure. It all comes down to communication. And now by the sounds of it, we are seeing a huge communication issue happening with city hall/ council members. It would be interesting to know what that is all about.

As to the meetings being combined, it sounds like maybe Adam is setting things up to be able to let the whole Thurston Road St Watch fall under the guidance of the public safety committee.

It know has been almost 2 years since we first heard the idea of setting up some type of website for tracking crimes in the 19th Ward. I am still all for the idea, but I'm not holding my breath.

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Permalink Reply by John Boutet on January 31, 2010 at 2:44pm

I think this comes more from participant in both meetings wanting to cut down how many meetings with overlapping concerns they have to go to. If you went to the 19WCA Public Safety Meeting, the PCIC Meeting and the Thurston Street Watch Meeting you got to hear CPO Kristin Runyon and Lt Ray Dearcop repeat the same police information. A lot of the same people attended all three meetings. A push to combine the 19WCA Public Safety and Thurston Street Watch Meeting started in December. John Borek who Chairs the 19WCA Public Safety Meeting with his volunteer hat on is on Adams staff and helps organize the Thurston Street Watch Meeting as part of his job. He had to get approval from the 19WCA Delegates Council to "combine" the meetings. That took place January 14. I attended the Delegates Council with Marian on another matter and got to hear John Borek make his request. The Council wanted the meeting to remain a separate meeting that runs sequentially with Adams. There may be a valid insurance or other reason for what otherwise looks like a "turf thing" but John came away with the agreement the meetings would run sequentially. Nevertheless people should plan on sitting through both so the same information does not need to be presented twice and people will benefit from knowing what goes on in both.

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Permalink Reply by John Boutet on January 31, 2010 at 8:04pm

I should also point out that for the 19WCA Public Safety Meeting January 6, 2010 Kristin Runyon sent out copious minutes to participants. Mark Sweetland submitted them as a blog post on Location19. In that meeting, which Kristin ran because John Borek had a conflict, Kristen jumped the gun and announced that the meetings would be combined and that consequently there would be a second 19WCA Public Safety Meeting on the last Wednesday of January, the day that Adam's meetings are. Since John was at this meeting he will probably be doing the minutes.

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Permalink Reply by Margy Meath on February 1, 2010 at 10:07am

Thanks for sharing all of this information John!
It seems confusing to me that there are 2 meetings with somewhat similar but not identical agendas/focus and that they run back to back.
It also sounds like any clear focus on Thurston is stalled and that we continue to suffer from conflicting/competing initiatives. I raised this issue at the first "Thurston Road" meeting (the 2009 version) and asked whether anyone is 'connecting the dots' re: all of these things - i.e. RAIN, the 'visioning events', the 19wca, Adam's initiative, the merchants group and PCIC.
It feels that we waste ridiculous amounts of time with raising issues, attending meetings, 'getting involved' only to see this energy and effort slip away due to lack of communication and poor follow through.
I have no doubt that many 19th ward residents are concerned about Thurston and want to see changes - attendance at the first 2 or 3 meetings proved this but we've now probably LOST that energy and lost the involvement of people who were motivated to get involved.

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Permalink Reply by Margy Meath on March 3, 2010 at 9:30am

Any news on "STREET WATCH"??

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Permalink Reply by John Boutet on March 29, 2010 at 10:12pm

The time for this Wednesday's 19th Ward Community Association, Public Safety meeting is 6:30 PM since we rescheduled it in series with Adam McFadden's Street Watch meeting. These meetings are henceforth scheduled on the last Wednesday of the month, with the public Safety Meeting at 6:30 and and Adam's Street Watch meeting generally set for 7:45 or so, but sometimes sooner if the Public Safety meeting is short. The two meetings were previously on separate nights running one hour each but have been changed to run serially, each about 45 minutes, on the same night to reduce the number of nights people need to come out. Most people in attendance came to both meetings anyway and the Crime Prevention officers who generally attend present the same information at both. Even if your main reason for attending is Adam's Street Watch meeting, it is best if you come at 6:30 so that presentations the officers make at the first meeting do not need to be completely repeated at the second. The topics of the two meetings overlap a lot.
Hope to see you all Wednesday March 31st at 6:30PM,
John

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Permalink Reply by John Boutet on March 30, 2010 at 2:31pm

John Borek's minutes from the February 24, 2010 19WCA Public Safety and Thurston Roatd Street Watch meetings were just sent out to the19thward@yahoogroups.com . Here they are for your convenience:

Minutes 19th Ward Public Safety Meeting/Thurston Road Street Watch
February 24, 2010

Burglaries: 20 % decrease in the last month. Arrests. Committed detail of extra police. Flint/Exchange/Plymouth area. 4 arrests total. Spruce/Congress/Brooks last 30 days. 5 of 54 burglaries were copper burglaries.

Department is under a new policy for deployment of new cameras. City committed to purchasing 20 cameras per year for City-wide distribution. Streamlining camera request process. John DeMott will co-ordinate all camera requests and request letters and compile one list off the requests. Official camera request form will be available in NSC office and available on line as well.
Officer Traverzo delivered a report on MX Energy who are making sales calls soliciting competitive services away from RG&E. Some residents are concerned that this is a scheme. They should not check inside your home, but so far this appears to be a safe solicit. If someone comes to your door selling something they need a permit.
The RPD Senior Crime Analyst did a presentation on 2009 crime statistics. We are seeing overall declines in crime at 25 year lows, particularly violent crime. SouthWest quadrant had the largest crime decrease in the entire city and Jefferson Avenue was down 60% in the violent crime category. Even burglaries is at one of the lowest rates in a quarter century. The spiking price of copper also contributed significantly to vacant house burglaries.
Quality of life concerns: Noise. Dogs barking. Penhurst/Lehigh area. General noise. Vacant cars. 50 feet during the day from 8 to 10; property line during the night from 10-8. Went through dog law.
Traffic Problems:
Frost and Epworth. One way do not enter. Couch in rock garden
Thurston onto Roxborough. Coming from Genesee Park onto Thurston. Speed bumps were denied. Emergency vehicles. Technology speed bumps have changed. Refer to Commissioner Holihan.
Thurston Road for 19th Street Watch: Administration gave list of drug arrests. Working on letters going to landlords and Monroe County DSS.
Adam sat down with a number of convenience store owners. He checked the price that they are selling blunts at. If you bought legally Dutch Masters it would cost you 56.95. 1.13 per Dutch master or blunt. If someone selling 1.25 or less, could be violating state law. We have very strict laws around tobacco. Draining sales tax. Takes 3 years for Sales Tax to find them. Set up under a new business with same employees. Corner stores: If you are busted for food stamp fraud, you cannot work at all for store that accepts food stamps. Operators frequently aren’t supposed to be in the store . State responsible for policing.
Website: Chief and Deputy Chief see value in crime mapping and determine trends. Can look at neighborhoods and get a sense of what is going on.
Which properties condoning drug sales are subsidizing through DSS or Section 8? Accompanied by a letter to landlord: we’d like to work with you. This is what can happen to your property. Going with civil action we don’t need any buys, just co-operation.
How do we determine problem properties: talk to patrol officers, calls for service, call warrants that are looking at a property.
Arson on Trafalgar. Still don’t have an arrest. Ongoing investigation.
Started conversations with the County. Children is a CPS issue; subsidies is a violation of the law. You’re in jeopardy of losing your monthly income or children. Right now we don’t have that conversation. County has not managed City client base well.
Short list: County to be presented with the list.
Officer Runyon. Bring drug report forms
Mechanism as incentive for landlords: volunteer attorneys. Have forfeited funds account to do the program. If you are a landlord that wants to get tenant out that will be provided for you through landlord legal aid.
County has ability to suspend payments without a hearing.
Next meeting: Wednesday, March 31st. 6:30 PM. Rochester Presbyterian Home, 256 Thurston Road
Respectfully submitted by John Borek, Committee Chair

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19th Ward Community Association
216 Thurston Road
Rochester, NY 14619
585.328.6571
19thward@19wca.org

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Permalink Reply by Elizabeth Smith on March 30, 2010 at 12:06pm

Just read the minutes of the last meeting on the 19th Ward site E mails. Thanks to John DeMott for keeping us posted and sending upcoming meeting alerts.

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