Community Members

Re: "But Richards is a big boy, and I don't believe any amount of pressure would've caused him to cave if he truly believed he was doing the right thing."

For once I agree: Richards IS out of touch with 99% of his constituents.

I am absolutely stumped as to why there are party affiliations in a DA race. It seems like the same kind of a job as a judge â€" you have a set of rules and you do your best to abide by those rules, and specifically you do _not_ let your own opinions or party affiliations override the rules. And related to that, I don't recall seeing judges affiliated with parties (and I presume that is because it's against the rules). So how can the DA even be affiliated with party lines? And why would a politically-charged party like the Conservative Party endorse one candidate over another? (And, by the way, why the heck is the County Attorney the Secretary of the Airport? It seems like a crap-shoot to get skills useful to both jobs.)

I'm reasonably confident with my assessment of criminal action, even without any formal legal theory training to back it up: there are crimes against a person (on their own spectrum from death, to harm, to constraint), and crimes against things (from destruction, to denying access, to damage). (There's crimes against nobody, but I'm talking about crimes that cause harm.) Any crime against a person is worse than a crime against a thing (so it's worse to kidnap someone than to blow up a building). As such, I agree with Good's assessment.

I say let them keep their dining area open 24 hours and close the drive-thru at night. That way noise would be contained in the building.

As I'm a resident in that neighborhood, I suggested that at a meeting. A McDonald's representative said they didn't want to do that because they felt their employees would be endangered. If your customers endanger your employees, I don't want them in my neighborhood. Perhaps a better relationship between your business and your customers is in order first.

Maybe www.rochestercitynewspaper.com/events/ should have an "Elections and Debates" category.

Let's hope you keep the list complete, lest you be thought of as less than journalists.

At least with a casino, the concept of the Mayor and City Hall gambling with the citizens' money can move from metaphor to reality. I hope they know that, over time, you always lose at gambling. And true-to-form, part of addiction is being unable to admit you have a problem.

Mr. Richards comment, "The bulk of the crime committed in our community is committed by young black men on young black men" is incorrect. The bulk of arrests made in our community is of young black men, ergo the bulk of convictions is young black men. Perhaps what police consider a crime (specifically a crime that warrants an arrest, handcuffs, and a trip downtown) and what they consider "suspicious activity" should be assessed, and then determine whether those things are different for blacks and for whites.

As a white male, I'd like to see everyone treated like I get treated. It's pretty good to be left alone to do as I please. I only get in trouble if I actually commit a crime. The idea of being harassed for simply being alive makes me bristle.

I don't know where to go to get the data, but I get the impression that crime (the number of police interactions that lead to convictions) is about the same or less than when we had a smaller police force under Mayor Johnson. When Duffy and now Richards continue a larger force than necessary, the police don't have enough to do. They begin to try and find crime to prevent which sounds noble enough except that it often leads to novice mistakes of perceiving crime when there is none. Exacerbating this is the larger force leading to a surplus of "Baby Blues".

To me, the "gold standard" is for every person questioned by the police to be convicted of a crime â�" ergo, that police only interact with people who are actually guilty of committing a crime. Although this is actually impossible, it would be a good start if police were measured on the number of people questioned (on the street), detained (questioned in custody), arrested, and convicted. It seems to me there are a lot of people questioned and a fair portion of them detained, but they are either released or arrested but never convicted. If this is true, it is a very disturbing situation.

I'd like to also mention that the police seldom know the law. There's a lot of laws and they can't be expected to know them all. But if an officer is in a situation they are unfamiliar with, they should have a way to quickly get a general sense of what is legal.

A friend of mine sought to find out in which lane to ride his bike on Main Street, as there is a black-diamond bus-only lane. He got different answers from different cops (right lane, left lane, on the sidewalk, not at all) and after working his way up the chain of command, never could find an answer. This means he can be stopped at any time based on the discretion of the officer he encounters which is also troubling.

If you think this is no big deal, when was the last time a police officer pulled you over and questioned you? It's not fun, and makes you feel like a criminal even if you aren't. It makes you question whether what you're doing is right or wrong, or why it is suspicious. It discourages those behaviors or the part that got you noticed (in this case, bicycling, which I argue is a healthy thing that is good for the city and far from something to discourage). When we have citizens questioning their law-abiding behavior, there is something deeply wrong with the system.

Consider that, according to www.13wham.com/news/local/story/Civilian-Review-Board-Operates-Outside-Spotlight/MP6p6qQAOEmfbXeLCdp24A.cspx , the "average complaint takes 210 days" for the Civilian Review Board. Internal police investigations are not snappy either.

The problem is that the police have no oversight. They operate how they please, and when that runs afoul of the law, there is no recourse.

From the tomorrow's JayceLand (per the Eastman House's e-mail), "Photographer Simon Norfolk was called back to assignment in Afghanistan, so in his absence, Thomas N. Tischer will present a lecture on New York City of the 1950s."