Bavina Moore has lived in Evanston for 10 years, but she’s never seen crime as bad as this.
“It’s worse this year. The crime here is really, really bad,” said Moore, an 8th Ward resident, motioning to the busy street in front of her apartment. “Break-ins are really bad.”
Moore would know. She said her apartment was broken into last month, with burglars taking jewelry, money, checkbooks and her grandson’s games and movies.
She certainly is not alone.
There were 988 burglaries and robberies in 2006, according to that year’s Police Crime Index. While the report for 2007 has not been released, Evanston Police Chief Richard Eddington told THE DAILY that there were 12 percent more burglaries in 2007 than in 2006.
A 12 percent increase would mean there were 1,107 such incidents in 2007.
The numbers for 2007 were up overall, but the situation hit a new level in November and December, Eddington said, partly because of the holiday season.
“In every jurisdiction I’ve worked in, there’s been a spike in property crimes and robberies around the holidays,” he said. “Criminals react to those same pressures that you and I do. They think ‘I wanna get someone who’s special to me a present.'”
But police said the numbers are especially disturbing this year and the crimes have continued throughout the holidays.
In the Eighth Ward, residents and politicians came together last week to discuss what they had recently seen in their neighborhood.
The meeting was called by Ald. Ann Rainey (8th), who declined to comment for this story.
“Alderman Rainey wanted her constituency to have an update on what the police were doing, how many officers were assigned, how many arrests had been made and any information they could share on their investigations,” said Evanston City Manager Julia Carroll.
Eddington told residents at the meeting that police stepped up efforts to combat the crime wave, beginning in mid-November.
“We have detailed two supervisors and six officials to a burglary suppression mission and they will be engaged in that activity until the situation is under control,” Eddington said. “They’re engaged in surveillance of known offenders and are surveying areas that are deemed to be likely targets of future burglaries.”
Police and city officials both said the mission has helped the situation, citing a number of burglary arrests in recent days, including the infamous “laundry room burglar,” who broke into several basement laundry rooms and stole money from the machines before being arrested December 30.
“You can just look at the daily bulletins and see that the number of burglaries have dropped since this extra effort has put on in that area,” said Carroll, who authorized the mission.
However, some citizens said they think the police could do more.
“Hell no (the police) are not doing enough,” said Dave Williams, a resident for five years. “They should be on the job more.”
Althea Ricketts, who lives on the edge of the 8th Ward, said she has heard from the community that the police response has been inadequate, but thinks they’re doing the best they can. Ricketts, the president of the Evanston/Skokie Council of PTAs, said the community as a whole should do more to fight crime.
“I’m not blaming the community,” she said. “What I’m saying is, call the police when you see strange people hanging out. Report strange happenings.”
One of the problems is the composition of the neighborhood, Moore said. Many young people who are unemployed but not in school have recently moved into the neighborhood, she said. These people “hang around street corners,” where incidents are more likely to occur.
“They need a center, you know,” she said. “A place for (young guys) to go to work out or get some type of skills.”
But other residents in the Eighth Ward, like 25-year ward resident Dan SoloMonday, say they haven’t noticed a spike in crime.
“It’s nothing an ordinary person would notice,” said SoloMonday, who had his car window smashed in last Sunday. “If you’re burglarized you feel terrible, but if not then you’re kind of unaware of what’s going on.”
One person who hasn’t noticed an increase is Mercedes Garcia, who also lives in the 8th Ward.
“It’s not really worse this year,” Garcia said. “It’s Howard, it’s the ghetto, it’s always been bad, you know?”
But resident Ben Schapiro said the ward is trying to improve, and that’s one of the reasons for the crime wave this year.
“That part of the ward is going through a pretty significant change over the last two years very much for the better,” he said. “What we’re seeing now is there’s stuff to take, places worth breaking into and working laundry machines in basements with money.”
Reach Brian Rosenthal at [email protected].
