Lumpy, it’s BAD. Don’t kid yourself. The incident I mentioned with the Karate mom was near Washburn and Dowling. As I said, in 1998.
I lived by Folwell Park from 1991 to 2002. Not quite your neighborhood, but close. When I moved in, I described it as: 1/3 old original owners, 1/3 blue collar whites, 1/3 blue collar blacks. The 1990 Census said 70% White, 20% Black, 10% other (Hmong, Native Americans, Arabs). By the time I moved out, the neighborhood had gone to shit. The 2000 Census said 70% Black, 20% White, 10% Other. Now that’s not to blame it on “black people”, it’s to point out that at least 50% (and more like 70%) of the homeowners had bailed in ten years. We went from being perhaps 80% Owner-Occupied, to being 70% Rental and at least 10% UNoccupied. I was quite happy to sell at the time, especially because I made a huge pile of dough doing it. Unfortunately, the house is clearly poorly kept up rental property now, with volunteer trees growing all over the yard.
Before I moved, I had gang members two houses down in one direction, three houses down in the other, a major drug house across the street and a party house around the corner with almost nightly parties in the middle of the intersection. The 12 year old kid in that drug house was caught wheeling the neighbor’s Harley out of his garage. He ran straight into his house and his mother threatened to shoot the guy for knocking on their door to see her about it. Then the cops blew him off, so they moved out within a month.
The little shit vandalized every house and car within range and nothing was ever done about it. But then, I called the special response unit about the drug dealing many times and they never responded either. It was so blatant it was pathetic. I could sit in my living room and see people handling rocks on the front porch. The first weekend of the month was always the worst. People would stop in the middle of the street, leave their cars running with the doors open (blocking the street), run up to the door and buy a rock.
The worst part of it was that after getting no response from the cops, I called my city council member. Within a week, my house was vandalized in retribution. Someone was protecting those drug dealing pieces of shit! In retrospect, I should have bought a video camera and sent the tape to the media.
That’s also where I had the five break-in attempts while I was home.
A friend of mine lived near Oliver & Lowry. He moved out in 2000 after someone was killed next to his garage. Just said “time to go” and got out quick.