Defend Youngstown

I was born in the rural area of Youngstown and now live just outside of the city limits. I work in the city and often find myself "Defending Youngstown" (even before the popular slogan!) It is an old town with many great attributes that I do believe is making a comeback. No, I can't shop at Strouss' and have a malt like I used to do in 1986 because they have long closed, but I do walk to the Butler, the YMCA and if you haven't visited Mill Creek Park, you are really missing something. I do not allow myself to be fearful of driving around the old neighborhood where my mother grew up and I used to run around or take my "shortcut" on the way home through the east side occasionally. I am appalled and often ashamed of some of my "suburban friends" who do not come to a football game at YSU because "you'd have to go into the city". Are you kidding me?

The homicide rate in Youngstown for 2007 was just shy of 40 people. This is horrifying for a city who in 1930 had a population of over 170,000 and according to the 2000 census was at around 82,026 . I fear the years of joblessness, aimlessness and lifestyle choices have finally caught up with a portion of the population now in the 2nd or 3rd generation of this cycle because most of the murders are criminals killing criminals. (Here is why I suspect this...when they show a picture of the deceased and it is a mugshot, they've haven't been living a squeaky clean existence...)

This was never more evident then yesterday when we had the dubious achievement of having the largest death rate from one crime in our history. An 18 year old man, allegedly angry over a argument about a cell phone, and who had a history of altercations with this particular family, poured gasoline on their front porch and set it on fire at 5:30 a.m. This fire moved so quickly that 6 members of the family were unable to escape, a grandmother, her daughter and her 4 grandchildren - ages 8, 5, 3 and 2. This senseless act is almost unimaginable to comprehend.
Our finest - The YPD and YFD were extremely quick and diligent to gather the information and arrest the suspect within hours and he is in jail, where I hope he will be for the rest of his natural life. (Fighting the instinct I had yesterday where I went back and forth from wanting him set on fire in the street, to letting him go and let the neighbors take care of him - I've calmed down now after horrifying my 11 year old with my suggestions.)

I was talking to a friend the other day - she is a recent college graduate and graduated from a city high school 4 years ago. She was saying how when she goes to her alma mater to do work now, she almost doesn't recognize it and can't believe how much things have changed in 4 years.

We were talking about what kept us out of trouble when we were growing up and agreed that it was the good old-fashioned fear of our parents (and grandparents) - both fear that we would disappoint them or (in my case) I would receive a visit from "the board of education" (yes, that they had a paddle with that logo on it - who manufactures those?)

I think when the economic downfall of our area came, most of the population still had a work ethic where you didn't sit at home and collect a check. You made the best of what you had, got an education and if you got out of line, your parents were there to put you back on it. When single-parent families became more prevalent than 2 parent families, the grandparents who "remembered when" were still there to instill some of these values - sadly these people are now gone. Working in the education field, it is so frustrating to try to get through to students that an education is their ticket out of any problems going on in their lives now, when so many parents don't support it.

My heart goes out to the family of the deceased and I will continue to wonder about the alleged firebug and his cohorts and family situation... sigh...

Post rant workout update: The January weather in Ohio is not conducive to my workout routine and I'm getting tired of it. It has been in the teens for almost a week now and I've been relegated to the rec center when I'd rather be outside walking or attempting to jog. The upside of the rec is that I finally overcame my fear of speaking to the student workers and pretending I knew how to use the machines and gave myself up to a nice girl named Krista who demonstrated the machines and gave me my own circuit workout to follow!