Lighting Orchard Street
Straight answers are hard to come by, which often is more of a problem than the the problem itself.
Bryan Dunn who lives in Seton Hill discovered that last week when he tried to get an answer to a simple question: what happened to the portable floodlight that police had put up at Orchard Street and Pennsylvania Avenue to curtail drug dealing? There is no street lighting in the area, and the community rallied to get the light, help cops and discourage the bad guys.
Drug dealers or vandals repeatedly broke the light. Finally, the light just disappeared, and Dunn wanted to know why. He sent an e-mail to the police and got an answer that shocked him: the light had broken so much the city wouldn't fix it anymore.
To Dunn, it was a surrender. The drug dealers had won, showed up the city and could go right back to business. In trying to find out who is supposed to fix the light and who actually made the determination to give up on the light, I got caught up in tangle of city agencies. The cops own the light but someone else has to fix it. That could either be the Department of Public Works or the Department of Transportation.
Where police got the idea the light would never be fixed remains a puzzle, and City Councilman William H Cole IV told me that whoever made that pronouncement was wrong and that he, the councilman, would get a light in the community that can't be vandalized and would stay until permanent lighting is installed.
Let me recap the absurdity. The police give a community a spotlight that the drug dealers keep vandalizing. Police say public works refuses to fix it so the light is being taken away. Public Works says it has nothing to do with lights and shifts the blame to transportation. Transportation then tells me that when a police spotlight breaks, police call transportation to haul it away and public works is responsible for fixing it. Public Works tells me they always fix the lights when broken and transportation tells me that the police told them they didn't want the light on Orchard Street anyway. (In case you want to know, transportation puts in the repair order and public works then bills transportation). That counters all the e-mails from a police major and sergeant, who put the blame on public works, and City Councilman Cole who told me the Central District major, John Bailey, was furious over the whole situation.
I finally heard back from the transportation department: the light has been fixed and will be replaced on Ochard Street. I had to call public works back to see if the light was repaired in a way that it couldn't be broken again, and Kurt Kocher, the spokesman, wasn't too reassuring. He said portable spotlights are repeatedly broken and repaired and broken again.
Here is the e-mail exchange over the past few days:
>>> bryanbdunn ... 12/09/08 1:35 PM >>>
Can I please have an update on when the crimelight will be reinstalled
at the foot of orchard and Pennsylvania ave?
Bryan Dunn
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Tue, Dec 9, 2008 at 2:22 PM, Police Sgt. Charles Hess wrote:
Mr. Dunn,
Hello,
The Light Towers and their placement is controlled by Balto. City`s Street Lighting Division of Public Works. Our contact person at Street Lighting advised me that the Light Tower that was at Pennsy. and Orchard is not scheduled to be replaced because of the damage done to the two previous light towers at that location.
Sgt. Charlie Hess
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Dunn then wrote to me:
That is the most ridiculous policy I have ever heard.
Can someone please let me know if thats is actually the policy? Let me get this straight, A light which is to prevent crime gets vandalized and the answer is to remove the light??? Read that out loud!!! It's really offensive that this is the response I get after waiting over a month for this, not to mention being told that they were working on a solution for the light! This only encourages bad behavior.
Seton Hill Association
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On Tue, Dec 9, 2008 at 5:28 PM, Police Major John Bailey wrote:
Bryan, we are at the mercy of off street lighting as they are the ones who repair the lights and they refuse. Don't you think I would like to have a light on every corner. It was not until recently that after begging for the lights to be returned that we received this answer. That is were it stands now however I have been working with councilman Cole in a resolution.
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Dunn responded to Bailey:
Thank you for your response. It is much appreciated. All I care about is having the light reinstalled, and eventually having the drug nuisance removed from our neighborhood. I understand your frustration and hope you can understand mine. Sgt. Hess's response basically told me, sorry the crime is too bad; We can't have a light there.
On another note, you should not be at the mercy of light maintenance people when it comes to community safety. That is a serious flaw to everyone's efforts, which I know is not your fault. Do you have the contact information of the person in charge of scheduling the lights?
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Dunn finally wrote to Mayor Sheila Dixon:
Dear Mayor,
Hello, I am Bryan Dunn, a board member of the Seton Hill Association. I have taken one of the leading roles on our crime committee and have fought vigorously over the last four years with other board members, people in the community and Baltimore City Government. We have a section 8 based community called Orchard Mews, which runs along the edge of Historic Seton Hill, where there is rampant drug traffic and violence on many occasions. I organized meetings with the Baltimore City Police, States Attorney's Office, Councilman Cole, Council President Rawlings Blake's office, Property Based Crime Solutions, Hud and the management of Orchard Mews over the last four years to help put pressure on the owners of this facility to fulfill their obligation to offer a safe place to live for their residents and the surrounding community ( In the last four years there have been two Homicide shootings and a non- fatal shooting last year, not to mention several search and seizures and domestic violence in Orchard Mews). Orchard Mews had finally agreed to having a security team patrol Orchard street but when the city discontinued allowing off-duty police, Orchard Mews went back to the drawing board and no security is present. So, in the meantime we were promised a crime light at the location of much of the illegal activity, which gets us up to speed of where we are today.
The crime light was placed at this location and was continuously vandalized. The light might have been on for a day or two before being shut off by vandals. It was repaired two or three times, then the light disappeared. I was informed that a solution was being worked out so the wires could not be accessed as easily. I waited a month, still with no light. I finally e-mailed Sgt. Charles Hess and he informed me the the Lighting Division of Public Works took the location off the schedule because it had been vandalized too many times.
I was shocked to find out that this was the policy, letting vandals feel that they won the battle. Major Bailey informed me he was at the mercy of the Lighting Division. Is there anyway to give the police more control in determining where public safety lights should be positioned? I truly look forward to your response and hope we can find a constructive way to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of truly needed crime deterrent technology. Thank you for taking the time to hear our community.
Bryan Dunn
Seton Hill Association
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Sgt. Hess wrote Dunn on Wednesday, at 4:27 p.m.:
Bryan, I was advised they are placing another light on Orchard St.
