(UPDATE) Pocomoke Community Awareness Meeting (10-9-10)

I arrived at the meeting place @ about 9:50 and I figured I was going to have to stand through the meeting, boy was I wrong. There were about 12 citizens present, and 8 civil servants (I think) that's close anyway.

Mr Todd started out the meeting with a very good start, he seamed genuinely concerned about the crime spree we are experiencing. He read a passage and ended his stand with "we must work together" "we must stop the blame game"

Mayor Mike McDermott was present and was the next to chair. He made his concerns and opinions in a short but sweet apology stating that he works on Saturday mornings and apologized for not being present at the previous meetings but stated his council is at the meetings and they are able to brief him. The Mayor stated that "a lot of our problems are from transient people" and "Pocomoke crime is down 20% and juvenile crime is down some 70%".

Chief Irvin talked about pretty normal business as usual stating officer duties, patrols  etc. and he asked about organizing a citizen group that could have block parties and that would be interested in forming groups the same things that didn't work in years past. Irvin went on to say "it's unfortunate that we had 2 murders but the town as a whole is safe"    

From the audience Mr Todd commented "crime watch groups are now pass'e" and "the police can't do everything"

Now here is where we start going south, it seams that the audience decided that they want to just take over, Carroll Overholt had raised his had until I'm sure he got tired of holding up, he did finally get a chance to speak and boy did he let it go which I'll get into later.

From the audience; Sorry I do not know the ladies name but she asked about junk and trash in peoples yards I thought oh no here we go on this and boy was I right, the Chief explained that the city has codes and that they towed some 60 (I think) vehicles just a short time ago and explains the standards that the city tries to maintain. The lady then says that "the cities standard is not as high as hers" and she goes on to say "I call city hall so much that Harvey Davis knows me personally" This went on for quite some time with some comments about about youth activities discussion thrown in from time to time like we do not have anything for our young ones to do, you know the same'ol same'ol.

At this point they discussed what kind of tools they would use to pick up trash, where they would start to pick up the trash what time they would start to pick up the trash etcedra etcedra.

And then it happened, The Mayor, from the audience, offered the statement "there's nothing worse to the black people than white people picking up trash in their yard" at which point Mr Todd says "wait a minuet, I think that's a racist thing to say"

The statement was addressed and it was determined that no one was offended.

Mr Todd says "I want to make something clear, I'm not saying that the Mayor is racist, I'm saying the statement was a racist thing to say"

At this point things were a little bit quieter and Carrol Overholt finally was able to make his statement after patiently waiting with his hand up for I really don't know how long.

Overholt says we lost a very good officer in Lt. Martin Koerner and then he makes it very clear that he did not believe that crime is down in Pocomoke and say that crime is up in Pocomoke.

Overholt went on to demand that the city call and/or sit down and talk to Lt. Martin Koerner and find out why he quit the department.

Overholt says "that for the Chief to stand up and say that our crime is down is a travesty" Overholt states that "Pocomoke City is more dangerous per capita than Salisbury.

Overholt says he is becoming afraid to let his wife and child come into the city alone. Mr Overholt was extremely passionate about everything he he stated today and anyone there should know he means business.

Mr Overholt ended by recommending that all at the meeting read The Pocomoke Public Eye to see the crime report. 

(UPDATED) sorry it was late when I wrote this and I left out a few things from my notes.

Marty Pusey was in attendance and she said a few rhetorical things but ended in "we have become disfranchised" "disenfranchised families" "disenfranchised children"

Lynn Duffy spoke and thanked the council and she also did a most honorable thing saying she will donate 750 hours of her time to get things going.

The Chief said that they have installed a light @ 4th and Bonneville because he said at any given time "there would be 20 to 30 people standing on that corner" the Chief said they have 2 more cameras on order, one to be placed @ 6th and Bank st. the other is to be placed @ the middle school basketball court the Chief says that the cameras should be up in about two months.  


I never did ask my question so I'll ask it here ......what the heck does picking up trash have to do with preventing crime?

The next meetings are

Oct. 16th @ 9:00am to start picking up trash

Nov. 13th @ 10:00am Landlord meeting both at the same church