Dispatch: Academy will train residents to fight crime

Mayor to launch program on South Side
October 08, 2003
THE COLUMBUS DISPATCH

Mayor Michael B. Coleman outlined the final piece of his crime-fighting plan yesterday: the creation of the Neighborhood Safety Academy.

The academy doesn’t have a building or charge tuition — it’s a curriculum that would travel to different neighborhoods where city employees would teach residents to prevent and report crime.

"I strongly believe fighting crime is everyone’s responsibility. Everybody," Coleman said.

"Police have a primary role. . . . But we can’t forget individual responsibility."

The academy will allow residents to be trained in their choice of topics — prostitution, burglaries, blight or speeding traffic.

Commentary:
As always, we are supportive of efforts to lower crime. But we do notice there is NO mention of the "individual responsibility" to fight violent crime.

That's because the Columbus Mayor opposes the very thing that could most directly and immediately lower violent crime in his city - concealed carry reform legislation.

Click here to read the entire story in the Columbus Dispatch.