Crime seepage justifies response

Boardman Township's crackdown on crime in the northern part of the community -- the city of Youngstown is across the border -- is eliciting a similar response from some black citizens to a comment made several months ago by Liberty Township Administrator Patrick J. Ungaro.
Ungaro, a former Youngstown mayor, said the city's problems, especially those related to crime, are seeping into the township, and he made it clear that Liberty police would be proactive in dealing with the situation.
Was Ungaro indulging in race-baiting? Of course not -- just as Boardman Township's anti-crime campaign isn't a disguise for racial profiling to dissuade Youngstown's blacks from driving across Midlothian Boulevard.
The fact of the matter is that the city's crime, of which there is plenty, is spreading to adjoining communities. Therefore, Liberty, Boardman, Austintown and others have a responsibility to do what they must to stop it from becoming an epidemic.
Unlike Youngstown, which has a police department with the wherewithal to tackle all levels of crime -- yet seems to be making limited progress with those involving guns -- the townships don't have the manpower nor the expertise to deal with the hard-core criminals who have operated in the city with such arrogance and disrespect for the law.
Black support
Boardman and Liberty law enforcement officials insist their anti-crime push is not race based, and there is no evidence to suggest that it is. In the case of Liberty, Ungaro's comments can hardly be viewed as racist, seeing as how his relationship with the black community in the city has been better than any other white politician in recent memory.
Indeed, when he was mayor, he received high praise from black residents for his no-nonsense approach to dealing with the gangbangers and other professional criminals who have held parts of the city hostage. His public clashes with the Youngstown Municipal Court and his impatience with Mahoning County Common Pleas Court judges led him to seek the federal government's help. A federal prosecutor was assigned to Youngstown and the feds agreed to run all crimes involving guns through their system.
Even so, Youngstown's homicide rate soared during Ungaro's tenure, and studies showed that many of the killers had long records and had somehow finessed the system.
(The lead editorial on this page comments about the resurrection of the gun-crime initiative announced last week by the new United States attorney for the Northern District of Ohio, Greg White.)
When Ungaro was appointed Liberty Township administrator, he made crime one of his top priorities after he began noticing that many of the crooks he knew about during his tenure as mayor were showing up in the township. It suggested to him that every time Youngstown cracks down on crime, the criminals move across the boundaries into communities that do not have the ability to launch similar campaigns.
For their part, Boardman law enforcement officials want to make sure that such criminals don't establish roots in the northern sector of the township.
As for the racial implications, an analysis of the arrests made in the township do not support the contention that blacks are being targeted or are being pulled over in traffic stops in greater numbers than whites.
"Society as a whole makes crime a race or class issue," Boardman Police Chief Jeffrey Patterson says. "I tried to make it clear in implementing this program that it is not a race issue, class issue or city vs. township issue. It's a crime issue."
But the chief is being diplomatic. FBI crime statistics do show that a majority of the violent crimes in the Mahoning Valley are committed by blacks -- with blacks as the victims, in most cases.
Reality
That is a reality that must be faced by the leaders of the black communities in the region. It isn't a matter of profiling, or targeting, or indulging in racist campaigns. It's simply the fact that when most of the serious crimes are committed by blacks, law enforcement will pay special attention to the community to protect the innocent.
Indeed, honest, law-abiding citizens in Youngstown want zero tolerance.
So, what should be done to deal with a crime problem that knows no bounds? It's time for officials in Youngstown and the adjoining communities to discuss the creation of a Joint Police District, which would bring about a multiracial force of hundreds of officers with jurisdiction in several communities.