This letter is with regards to Mayor Dianne Watts’ efforts to make Colebrook Road “safer.’
It is laudable that Watts is acknowledging that something has to be done about the dead bodies that keep showing up on Colebrook Road. However, the implementation of Closed Circuit TV and better lighting is not the solution to the problem. To be frank, it is a waste of time and money.
Sure, the special lighting will provide better visibility and electronic surveillance is up to snuff, too. However, all this will do is result in displacement. This means that the bodies will be dumped in areas that are not well lit and have no cameras.
Even an increased police presence will not help the problem. Just focusing on the location where the body is being dumped is not getting to the root cause of the problem.
Whoever was dumping bodies there will merely avoid the area and dump the bodies in a different area.
To make matters worse, the mayor chose to announce all these changes. It would have made more sense if these changes had been implemented in silence. Why tip off the perpetrators?
If by some miracle Mayor Watts’ solution of changing the physical environment (lights and cameras) results in some sort of success, hopefully the benefits will spill over to other locations where cameras and new lights were not installed.
Shadae Wallace
