A friend is not coming to New Orleans because of the crime

A friend had planned to spend a few days in New Orleans enjoying the sites and spending lots of money (what the city needs) but she changed her plans because of concern over the crime problem. The Governor has sent in the state police and national guard to help the local police combat crime driven by drugs and turf battles. My wife and I visit the French Quarter often, as I say, saving the city one beer at a time. But the crime news is incredibly troubling and I am rethinking my own plans to Let the Good Times Roll. It breaks my heart.

The city survived the hurricane but I don't know if it will survive its own residents.

or is it just the news?

Last time I was there I never felt at risk and my son and I were out in the early morning hours. Such a shame if it is truly that bad. Things are very hard to say the least.

last Saturday with machine guns. A cop was shot to death earlier this week, two more are in the hospital. I haven't checked today's news. The French Quarter is relatively crime free but the neighborhoods where the bad stuff is going on ain't far. Because of the hurricane some "turf" in uninhabitable so those occupants go looking for other "turf" and the bloodshed continues.

I had heard about that but not the details. Time to connect the dots to tragedy, poverty, homelessness and human frustration and anger. Not to mention just about everything else this maladministration is doing to the people. Such a shame.

not sure where the "machineguns" rumor came from...

I still go every two weeks. Crime there was much worse during the crack boom.

in NOLA this weekend!
Some people are worried, I hear, but I don't think it's any worse than "usual". Tourists in the Warehouse District and the Quarter and the Faubourg Marigny are pretty much left alone, except for the normal scam artists, whores, and pickpockets around Jackson Square and drunks getting rousted/mugged on Bourbon St.
NOLA has always had a high crime rate. Usually those shootouts are gang turf wars, sometimes even with cops! This whole NG was a stunt.
The stuff your friend will want to see will be pretty safe. One drawback, the streetcars still aren't in full operation yet, so a car rental may be necessary (it will be very, very hot and very, very humid).

I may go down this weekend and I'm familiar with the crime past and present but it still is unsettling. I'm not sure the NG was a stunt. Many people who live in New Orleans are saying its about time; saying that they should have been called in long before the hurricane. If its a stunt its an expensive one. Because they are so many vacant homes, there is a considerable amount of looting that still goes on and the turf wars issue has been exasperated since some "turfs" no longer exist and there has been a migration to other turfs. Incredibly sad, but it has me rethinking my small contributions to New Orleans financial recovery, one beer at a time.

Things seem to be okay where he is.

I lived there for 6 years and worked for WWL-TV. There was always a huge problem with black on black crime in the bad parts of town.

If your friend stays in the French Quarter and many popular parts of Uptown and doesn't get too trashed, he or she will be fine.

Wait until you see how many of us are coming down there for the 1st anniversary of Hurricane Katrina to protest Bush's failure to help your city recover from that disaster!!

And I'll buy you a beer when I get there.

A damn good reason to hit the city!

Any major US city has crime and no police force can prevent every murder. Our police force has roughly the same number of officers as before Katrina. Nagin's request for the national guard troops was nothing but political grandstanding and has caused us to get a lot of bad press. To quote a certain president, I assert my firm belief that the only thing we have to fear is fear itself.

Ooo wee, sher, dem crazy gun nuts all ovuh 'duh place. Wus' wit' Nagin, bra?

rest and down time it deserves.

Folks forget that the majority of them saw some awful sights during Katrina, their homes suffered damage and they had to work 12 to 18 hours a day during the months after Katrina.

They have to heal and rest and many of them may have PTSD as do a great many of the citizen survivors in Louisiana and Mississippi.

Let the guard help, that is what they are meant to do, not fight in a war on some foreign soil.

Personally, I would like to thank the police for all they have done. :grouphug:

And if that is an added bonus for bringing in the national guard, then I'm all for it. However, I don't think that bringing in the guard will lead to more time off for the police force to deal with these issues and I honestly think that Nagin could care less about PTSD within the police force. My dad believes that the exact opposite will happen. He says that the idea of bringing in the national guard is so that the guard will be doing typical patrol work and the police force will spend most of its time craking down on drug dealers. I'm not sure if he's right and I hope that he isn't, but that seems like the most likely scenario to me. When national guard come in to relieve police it seems that they tend to do patrol work and not any of the really dangerous stuff.

personal time they have while they can. How can they be denied when there is a greater presence with the guard available to cover for them while off.

I pray they will, too many have had to continue to be strong and brave when they themselves needed understanding and strength from others.