Upcoming editorial: The county should crack down on scrap metal dealers
Here's a preview of an editorial we're working on. Let us know what you think. The best comments will be posted alongside it in the print edition.
In Baltimore County, violent crime is down, but incidents of theft are up. What’s driven the increase is the lucrative market for scrap metal that has thieves yanking copper pipes out of the walls of vacant apartments and swiping catalytic converters from parked cars with the help of nothing more exotic than a cordless saw.
Between 2005 and last year, theft of valuable metal has increased 500 percent in the county, police report. It now represents nearly 2 percent of all the burglary and theft cases investigated by the county police.
Tonight the Baltimore County Council has a golden opportunity to clamp down on the growing problem with a law that would require scrap metal processors to keep close records of what they buy -- including checking the identification of the seller. They would also have to hold for at least five days items such as street light poles and cemetary urns that police may want to investigate as potentially stolen.
This last requirement has proven to be one of the most controversial elements of the measure, but it’s essential that the council not relent on the waiting period despite considerable lobbying by the county’s 18 scrap dealers who stand to be inconvenienced.
While it’s understandable that dealers might protest the law, they’ve only themselves to blame. When 12-year-olds can walk into a scrap yard pushing a grocery store car full of copper gutters and manhole covers to make a sale no questions asked, something is amiss.
That perhaps only a few dealers have allowed themselves to become fences for criminals, unwittingly or not, is beside the point. The new rules must apply to all -- and they are the county’s best hope for dealing with the problem.
What’s particularly infuriating about metal theft is the damage the perpetrators leave behind. By removing pipes for which they may receive a few dollars, they may cause hundreds, if not thousands, of dollars of damage to some new home under construction.
In one of the most audacious examples, thieves removed aluminum bleachers from Kenwood High School early last year. In another, copper wiring was ripped out of nine apartment buildings. Police rarely, if ever, catch the perpetrators. It’s simply impossible to post officers at the entrance to every scrap yard all day every day.
Admittedly, the fortunes of the scrap industry have diminished with the economic recession this year, and metal thefts in the county are down, although probably only temporarily. Police Chief Jim Johnson suspects the outlook will change as world industries recover and the demand for, and prices of, precious metals rise.
That leaves the County Council with an opportunity to adopt a shining example that Baltimore and the state’s other counties -- and perhaps eventually the Maryland General Assembly can emulate. -- County Executive James T. Smith Jr.’s proposed restrictions on scrap processors would make it much harder for criminals to sell their ill-gotten gains -- or at least less lucrative if they have to travel far to make any sale.
Comments
The Baltimore County Council finds the provision requiring scrap metal processors to hold items for five day controversial? What should be controversial is that this issue hasn't been addressed by them before now.
Posted by: Sean Tully | October 30, 2009 12:47 PM
Another common sense reform by Jim Smith. I'm in the insurance industry and reforms like this save us all money.
Posted by: Insurance Man | October 30, 2009 3:47 PM
Just checked my calendar; yep 2009.
Why is this measure only now becoming a law in Baltimore County?
Welcome to the 1980's Jim.
Posted by: MrRational | October 30, 2009 4:32 PM
Didn't a PG County criminal GA member interfere with a bill like this in PG? Turned out he had interest in a scrap yard?
I cannot remember his name.
Posted by: Fed Up | October 30, 2009 4:42 PM
The scrap metal dealers have been profiting from stolen goods too long to endorse this law. But not only should the dealers be held accountable we should also catch and dismantle the miscreants for whom scrap metal thievery is a regular career. The vandals raid electricity grids and urban sewage systems with impunity and cause millions of dollars in losses to public and private properties. There is a thriving global black market in stolen scrap and governments are complicit. The Chinese have an insatiable need for scrap metal and this has fueled terrible wreckage across Africa with hucksters vandalizing telephone and railway lines. I remember driving across South Africa sometime ago and stopping by at a town plunged in darkness, businesses there at a grinding halt, due to a black out from stolen electric lines. Jim Smith is a smart and sensible man. His proposed law that will stay the hand of scrap metal dealers may be a local legislation but it has the potential for global reach if many counties across the US join in the effort to curb the stolen scrap metal scourge that bleeds governments and private citizens alike.
Observer
Posted by: Anonymous | October 30, 2009 9:00 PM
I've often wondered about those "Gold for Cash" mail-in businesses. Burglar steals jewelry, mails said jewelry to the company, and voila -- a check shows up in the mail within 24 hours.
Seems shady as hell to me.
Posted by: Carol Ott | November 1, 2009 9:37 AM
This is the right bill at the right time and the County Executive should be applauded for introducing it and working with the industry to make it workable. Scrap metal theft is a major problem that needs addressing, and hopefully this bill will spur the State to pass similar legislation in the 2010 session.
Posted by: Michael | November 1, 2009 10:30 AM