“I CAME TO SANTA MONICA FROM THE east coast in the 1960s and at that time it was very safe. You could walk down Wilshire Boulevard at midnight and never had to be worried about being assaulted. There was the occasional bar where a drunk came out of. But that was about it. Now today, we hear helicopters and sirens and I think it’s a sign of the times. Society has changed quite a bit. We have gangs that are committing crimes. We have homeless people who have mental disorders. And I think that hearing helicopters is discouraging in one way, but in other ways it makes me think we are being kept safe. When I hear a police car with its siren on it concerns me, but yet it makes me happy to know that they are trying to make our city a safe one.”
Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on March 3, 2007. Read the original PDF.