San Francisco, just across the Bay Bridge from Oakland, is undergoing a crime wave. Or is it? There’s been a lot of reporting and videos about car break-ins, anti-Asian muggings and mass shoplifting, or “looting” as it’s more properly called, from department stores, which is why Walgreens and Target are on the verge of closing their stores in the city.
Yesterday, San Francisco Mayor London Breed and Police Chief Bill Scott, playing defense, felt it necessary to host a news conference in which they offered reams of statistics showing that in many cases—robbery, rape, larceny theft—crime is significantly down, and even where it’s up—arson, auto theft, burglary, aggravated assault—the increases are modest, measured in single percentages, except for homicide: up 18% this year.
The city’s district attorney, Chesa Boudin, explained things this way: “We…know that, despite the data, many people do not feel safe.” And as the old quip goes, perception is reality.
Here in Oakland, the perception certainly is that crime is rampant. But it’s not just the perception; the statistics prove that Oakland is a violent, dangerous place. An online site called Neighborhood Scout crunches crime numbers in various cities. Here are a few results for Oakland:
- On a scale of 1 to 100, where 100 is the safest, Oakland’s “crime index” ranks at 1.
- Oakland’s violent crime rate is 12.94 per thousand, compared to 4.41 per thousand for all of California
- A person’s chances of being a crime victim in Oakland is 1 in 77, compared to 1 in 277 for the rest of California.
- There are 65.78 property crimes per thousand residents committed each year in Oakland, compared to 23.31 in the rest of California.
- Your chances of being the victim of a property crime in Oakland are 1 in 15, compared to 1 in 43 in California as a whole.
- Oakland has an average of 607 crimes per square mile, compared to 83 per square mile in California.
Oakland residents don’t have to be aware of these statistics to know that it’s a dangerous place. At the same time, we have dishonest and irresponsible politicians, like Cat Brooks and Carroll Fife, who remain insistent that the Oakland Police Department has to be cut, cut, cut to the bone, in order to stop “racist cops” from “brutalizing” innocent people. In yesterday’s blog, I wrote about Fife’s lie that “Police don’t prevent crime, they respond to it.” I pointed out the logical absurdity of that statement. Today I will quote Chief Scott in further demolishing Fife’s lie. “Deployment matters,” he said at the news conference. “I’m gonna say this over and over again because I can’t say it enough. We need officers on the streets…”.
Please say it over and over again, Chief Scott. Maybe Fife will hear the truth: Deployment matters. I’m not hopeful, because she’s so filled with bitterness that she has willfully blinded herself to reality. But we can hope, and pray for her to come to her senses, and if she won’t, we can recall her and elect a replacement who really cares about the people.