Albany Common Council President Corey Ellis is calling for a clampdown on crime and a new approach to quality of life issues in a city that has been plagued with gun violence.
The Madison Park neighborhood has gained notoriety over the last several years as a place where violent crime happens often. Ellis says when he spoke with police Chief Eric Hawkins about residents' and business owners' concerns, the chief answered his team is doing what it can do. Ellis sees the council as the city's "last line of defense."
"When people are feeling frustrated, they don't feel that there's a presence there," Ellis said. "As a legislative body and the council looks to figure out how can they act? And how can they be part of the solution? And I believe that with our business owners, when you hear a business owner say 'I'm going to, I'm done with Albany' after multiple events, at his shop, and around the area. You don't want you don't want business to close because once businesses leave, then we've lost. businesses leave those job opportunities are gone. Residents feel services are leaving."
Ellis says he was deeply affected by criminal activity portrayed in videos he was shown.
"Very disturbing. Individuals come into a place of business and beat up an unarmed man. An individual walking down the street gets punched, repeatedly and kicked. And when you see those things on video, and it's during the day, there's a feeling that there's a feeling of lawlessness happening in the city, and also a feeling that there's no one looking out," Ellis said. "There's no one protecting so I can do this in broad daylight. And either nothing will happen to me. Or there's no one coming to the rescue. So when you see that and you hear it not just from business owners but residents feeling unsafe. That's when as a council, as council leader and also with my fellow council members, you have to figure out what can we do."
Ellis likes an idea put forth by 2nd ward Councilor Derek Johnson: situate a community center in every neighborhood. A place to go that brings hope and opportunity, a component of a plan to address so-called "hot spots" like Madison Park, and give communities back to their residents.
"What I focused on part of our plan, part of that resolution would be, looking at increasing law enforcement patrols in hotspot areas, including calling on other law enforcement agencies if necessary," said Ellis. "We're calling on the appropriate department to look at how do we determine what is a hotspot area and how do we deploy resources or things of that nature that was hotspot. We would be looking at the city to develop a program to create new community quality of life patrol programs. A patrol program for hotspots. What does that look like? How do we engage our community services and, and our healthcare services when it when it comes to hotspot? How can they be helpful as well help be those eyes and ears and safety nets. Also to work with community based organizations to develop a community gun violence intervention plan around hotspots."
Ellis defined "hot spot" with Madison Park in mind.
"I look at a hot spot as where you can see crime, quality of life issues on a consistent basis, when those calls are coming in," Ellis said. "And those calls are not just violent calls, those calls are, you know, we have individuals who continue to vandalize and throw things and yell and scream and won't leave. Those are quality of life issues. They happen in our parks a lot. We have a lot of people in our parks, we want our parks to be welcoming when our parks to be safe. But we do understand, especially in that park, there's an element there that attracts the wrong element of people in the wrong element of actions, and we can no longer stand for it."
In a recent appearance before the council, Chief Hawkins suggested the APD was close to making an announcement about the June 25th murder of Benjamin Rowe. Around 2 a.m. officers found the 25-year-old on the 500 block of Hamilton Street near Madison Park. Rowe, well-known in the local music scene, had been shot in the torso and later died at Albany Medical Center.
Ellis, who was born and raised in Albany, says he was told Rowe was killed while assisting someone because he felt they wouldn't be safe walking by themselves.
"When I heard that side of the story, it was even more heart-wrenching," Ellis said. "Because it showed anytime you have people who are wanting to protect someone else's someone else and lose their life and doing that. It definitely says that as a city, we have to do better. We have to make it where parents and people understand that they can walk safely."
Ellis says no one should be scared to walk through an Albany neighborhood especially in daylight.
"When the criminal element feels like during the day, that he can commit a crime on a person just walking down the street, or walk into a business and beat someone up," Ellis said. "That means they don't feel there's anything coming around the corner that's going to hold them accountable, or that's going to put them where they belong. And that isn't in the back of a squad car in handcuffs. So they believe they can commit those crimes, and we have to stop it."
Ellis believes it’s time for the 15-member council to take legislative action that will help empower police and civilians to combat lawlessness, but admits local laws and proclamations are one small component when it comes to taking back troubled areas of the city.
"We have to make people feel safe. And it's not about what we say we're doing. But that has to be replicated back to us, where our where our citizens say, oh, yes, this is making a difference. It used to be like this. And I feel differently, and we are moving forward. Because the hope is what's going to drive us to grow. We can't program ourselves out of this issue. We can't police ourselves out of these issues, we have to grow ourselves out of these issues. And growing means creating an atmosphere where our kids can grow. Our kids can feel safe. Our kids feel like there's opportunity. And when you do that, you have to be able to provide those opportunities for them when it comes to jobs. So if our business leaders and our business owners feel like this city is not safe, and they leave, that has taken another part of that hope away from our children who were born and raised in this city," said Ellis.
