In April of 2006 (wow, I've been doing this for a while), I received an e-mail from a woman who lived out of state and was going to be moving to the Atlanta area. She wrote me to ask about the rabid crime in Dunwoody as it was being shown in Money Magazines 2005 index of the best places to live; as being a very, very high crime affected area. I viewed the data, replied the best I could to disavow the claims and then copied the DeKalb North Precinct, DHA and the Dunwoody Crier for assistance. The police department explained that Dunwoody was not a city and that crime rates were not kept for just that small section of DeKalb County, in fact the crime rates being reported were the total crime rates for all of unincorporated DeKalb County. The Crier ran a nice article explaining the situation and even had Money Magazine retract the data off the website because of the error.
Fast forward two years where the current DeKalb Police Department is in complete disarray, crime is up and the number of police officers is way down with no quick fix in sight. Money Magazine is again trashing Dunwoody by saying that our personal crime stats are 6 times worse then the other places on the survey and 3 times worse than the average property crime statistics. This again is probably based on the entire unincorporated crime statistics which if accurate is just another reason for all the citizens of DeKalb to demand better from this Administration then they are currently receiving.
Then again, the demands of the citizens are ignored every day in this administration. I have witnessed citizens lining up to speak at the County Commission meetings asking for improvements to the police department, a Grand Jury has made recommendations for change and even the police officers themselves are revolting by airing their concerns over department mismanagement in public; yet Vernon Jones and the County Commissioners take no immediate action to correct the situation.
Those most affected by crime are ignored while the CEO is guarded by a large entourage of officers in order to protect his own personal safety from the people that he himself has the responsibility to protect.
The Citizens for Dunwoody police task force has been exploring the police needs of the future city and they were able to piece together Dunwoody's crime statistics for the last six years that show that serious crime has almost doubled in that time period. I'm sure it was no easy task in getting this information since the DeKalb County Police Department website has no county wide statistics, no drill down tool to see what happens in your neighborhood; no crime information at all? Is it purposely done this way to keep the citizens of DeKalb feeling sheltered up to the day that crime finally happens to them?
In 2007, DeKalb County set a new homicide record of 99 murders yet with it being less than half way through 2008, the DeKalb Officers site reports that the County is again on a record pace with already 59 homicides so far this year. That statistic isn't publicized anywhere officially because if it were someone might ask...
Vernon Jones & Terrell Bolton, what are you doing about this situation?
People are dying to know.
People are dying to know.
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