My husband and I moved to Morse Ave. just two weeks ago from Orlando. We love our new condo, it's a great price and close to the beach, good restaurants, and public transport. But, I too, am afraid to walk to the Morse El. I work downtown and choose to take the bus rather than subject myself to heckling, sexual harrassment, and clutching onto my purse for dear life.
The only time I venture that way is to walk to Church on Sunday mornings which I feel is the least sleazy time around that place.
I get it, we live in a city, and we always have to be on guard. But why aren't cops always patrolling? Why aren't those sleazy liquor stores shut down?
I wrote the Alderman when I was moving to the area saying that I was optimistic about all the rehabbing going on in the area and I was hopeful that he would focus on cleaning up the crime surrounding the Morse El Stop. He never wrote me back, despite that fact that I told him I'm a producer for a major TV network.
Signed,
Anne
19 comments:
Anne, welcome to Rogers Park. Do you hire freelance writers? I have writing samples, if you are interested. Yes, this is a serious inquiry. I'm always looking for work. Well, work that pays anyway.
- PEACE -
Anne; since you are a Producer for a "Major Network" you have the power to do a major story on what is as well as what is not going on here in Rogers Park.
Your research can start be scanning all the stories on this blog, then you can talk to people like Craig, progun,the north coast, as well as many others.
You can bring the story of what joey says & what joey does to light.I hope you use the career you have to make well needed changes start happening by putting the spot-light on the 49th ward
If you want a vicims point of view Read "Lucky" by Annie Seibold.
Some of the crimes that happen stick with the victim far longer than the sentance if the criminal is ever caught and proscuted.
The alderman didn't respond to a person with access to a TV camera?
That's impossible.
Some member of his staff must have accidently hit the delete button and be too afraid to tell him...
I posted this in the blog with my email to Craig (the one about going to Morse Market), but it got lost in all the back and forth with ms and their backward views.
Anne, you might just be exactly what we need around here. I don't know exactly how this would work, or if it would even be possible, but as you are associated with a major tv network, perhaps an expose? You have witnessed first-hand how involved our lovely Alderman is, and just how quickly things are getting better around here (or not). A good dose of City-wide humiliation for moorey might just be what is in order. Even the South Side aldermen can boast of some improvements in their areas (though if it's true I don't know first-hand). It's time that RP change the way people look at it. I can bet there would be plenty of people willing to go in front of the camera and share their personal experiences, like progun or craig. (I'm not speaking for them, I'm just guessing). The North Side of Chicago should be a clean, well-developed, safe area that the City can be proud of, not a neglected, crime infested unwanted child.
Listen. I am all too cognizant of the anxiety that can be had on a walk to the morse L line at certain times of the day (or night). But I am woman who walks there most mornings to take the L and have been rarely, if ever hassled. The drug dealers and drunks are still sound asleep before 8 am. And ANY time you take the L please wear a purse that straps across your body or a fanny pack (even though it can look nerdy) for safety's sake. Going one L stop south (Loyola) or north (Jarvis) will also help on the later times of the day. I agree that putting a spotlight on this area will help, so hear hear to those suggestions. I think it is important to be as visible as we can be on that block without compromising our safety. I just walked to the Morse Market this afternoon. The market, as always was clean, bustling, and full of delicious produce and a plethora of ethnic foods. I had to past a group of drug addict/drunks that often hang out in the lake park by Morse. They were in the middle of some kind of argument about money, and had dispersed by the time I left. Every other person was a mother with kids, groups of sober guys chatting, and young couples hanging out. A pleasant sight. Let's promote those businesses that anchor the neighborhood and make our presence known!!!
I am new to the neighborhood as well (since thursday), live on the 1600 block of farwell. (moved here to be close to loyola campus, where I work - turns out I'll be in the downtown campus...) I walked to the grocery store twice and have not been afraid. can I also be a blog entry?
No really now - I have seen a couple of cool bars in the neighborhood, red line tap, duke's, morseland. I want to check them out. Is it really stupid to walk home alone from these places passed midnight? My girlfriend is not much of a barhopper, are these pretty cool places to hang out alone?
Anne- Welcome to RP. I moved from the area 2 yrs. ago, but still visit friends in the area. Craig does a great job keeping residents posted on helpful information through his site. Hopefully you will be able to cast a brighter light on the area through your work. Welcome!
my girlfriend got a free ride from the police to my condo after she got off the morse stop at 9:15 last week.. they saw her and told her "she shouldn't really be walking around here" - its really a shame
Anne -
Welcome to Rogers Park - Hope you and your husband have a great time here and make some good friends – it’s easy in RP – once you get used to our vaunted diversity – parts of it can be trying – But there are some amazingly accomplished and talented and interesting folks of all stripes living here too – you just need to look past the drug dealers and hookers -
Rogers Park is many wonderful things –
A great place to live – until your kids are ready to go to school – then, unless you are rich and can afford a private alternative, and don’t mind having your kids educated in a Rich Kid Ghetto, you’ll be moving to somewhere where the schools don’t suck …… if you find out where that is let us all know ……..
RP is a vintage neighborhood in a wonderful location - lake, trans etc. – once …. Many years ago it was a lot like Evanston … separated at birth …….
RP is a nature preserve for old hippies and geriatric Marxists – its almost a anthropologist wet dream … except there are more scenic places out west that have some REAL hippies and some REAL Marxists …. Lots of the folks in RP are ersatz people … acting out the moves of being artists and writers and musicians and whatever ….. they are fun to watch … for a while …..
RP is home and powerbase to Joe "the election stealer" Moore - twice the sleaze and half the integrity of Hinkey Dink Kenna (you'll find out about HDK sooner or later). Oh yes …. Joe’s girlfriend has braces ….. so sweet ….
Generally, RP is a resistance free zone for slumlords – thanks muchly to AlderTheif Joe – Mostly all you need to do is give Joe $$ and the dogs are shooed away from your door. Last year one of Joe Moore’s very best buds and big $$ supporters, Jay Johnson, burned six kid to death in one of his slums – afterwards Joe said (right up in front of the cameras no less) “Jay’s a good guy….” Take it for what its worth.
RP is generally a resistance free zone for drug dealers and gang-bangers – thanks muchly to AlderTheif Joe – Joe spends lots of his time flitting around the country getting his squishy face in front of the cameras spouting off about a thousand and one things – none of which have anything to do with improving our neighborhood – the job he is supposed to do and the job he collects his bloated paycheck to do – If you want to win your Pulitzer – dig up the stinky on Joe Moore, Jan Schakowsky, and the dirty political slush fund machine they run up here scraping $$ out of public housing and 501c3 “help the poor” programs ……. In RP we spell progressive H-Y-P-R-O-C-R-Y-T-E .... scream it loud scream it proud .....
RP is noted for having the highest concentration of registered sex offenders in the city – Goooooo Team!!! At least we’re winning something –
RP has a few nice places to go – Especially the Morseland and Dukes and Lifeline Theater – some of the Mexican places on Clark are pretty OK too …..
RP has a few repulsive places to go to also – especially the Heartland Café and the other businesses associated with Michael James – a known inappropriate harasser of female employees – and outspoken apologist for gang-bangers and their shenanigans– “They’re just good kids and you’re just a Racist ….” Oh yes – he’s also a big Joe Moore supporter – that way his stink-o kitchen doesn’t get inspected and his fire trap saloon doesn’t get inspected – One hand doing something for the other hand and all that ……. it is rumored Mike J is a good contact for all your herbal smoking needs … at least he does SOMETHING real for the community ……
Rogers Park is home to DevCorp North – a Mutual Admiration Society of self-dealers, skimmers, parasites and hypocrites. The high point of their existence , those corrupt insiders at the public trough, was the creation of a monstrosity of a suburban strip-mall shopping center, right here in the middle of an urban neighborhood. That one did almost as much good for the community as the wonderful Mural on The Hell Hole - Morse Avenue - that Kim Bares gave us all - with our tax dollars BTW – that is, what dollars DevCorp didn’t skim off the top …… As you scurry home hoping not to get mugged on Morse Ave, look up and be inspired by its beauty – and think how the $$ might have been better spent …..
Rogers Park is a great place to have a dog – if you don’t mind exposing your dog to some of the above ……
Rogers Park is referred to as a real BLOGGY kind of place …. I’m not sure they didn’t mean FOGGY ….. it’s the land that time forgot …. At least it looks like it is …...
Some day – if Joe Moore finally goes away, and some of the old hippies finally get packed off to the home, and a few of the ventures that are being attempted (by folks who don’t slurp up to all these political vultures and nest lining parasites hanging around) actually come to happen, you just might break even on your condo – hey - if that stuff happens you might even decide to stay …..
Until then girl, watch your back when you’re walking down The Hell Hole ….. Craig doesn’t call it that for nothing ……..
And Welcome Anne - if we could only get 5000 of you .....
Rogers Park Booster (retired)
I don't believe that going three blocks out of your way to another el stop will help.
Especially don't go clear up to Jarvis if you need to be on Lunt or Greenleaf. The Jarvis stop is pretty dodgy, too, and those are three dangerous blocks in the dark back to Greenleaf or Lunt.
If you are going to go that far out of your way for safety's sake, go clear to Howard and ride the 147 bus back down. I do this in winter when it's too cold to walk 3 blocks.
Just a suggestion.
Naive is as Naive does
It’s a real shame watching naive people try to do naive things for a neighborhood that doesn’t deserve a gift as big as the one proposed for that derelict Cobblers Mall theater. I hear it is supposed to be a 3 million dollar gift …. What kind of goofy people would do such a goofy thing? Mysterious ……
From what I hear and what I read and what I saw at their Joe Moore dog and pony show (way back when) the Magee boys are probably OK guys as far as it goes, even though the old man sounds like a bit of a grumpy old shitball. Unfortunately, taken all together, the Magees and their investors must be the dimmest lights in a box of worn out bulbs.
Looking at Morse Avenue what can they possibly be thinking? Who in their right mind would see improvement on that pig sty row? There must not be a mental health questionnaire attached to the building permit application, or they would have been laughed out of City Hall.
There is a difference between vision and hallucination. I for one find it hard to imagine anything decent ever happening on a street full of Gang-Bang Scum running wild without any police involvement, political support, or real community intervention.
If Rogers Park had the moral compass to stand up for what is right or good, and could somehow lay down the line on what is obviously destructive and wrong, I’d give these Don Quixotes a fighting chance. But where are the police? Where is the real community support for change on that sewer of a street? The bloggers point out the obvious, and Rogers Park yawns. People get molested and Rogers Park yawns. A decent guy gets an election stolen out from under him (the community too) and Rogers Park belches.
The Dreamer Magees and their Dreamer Friends may pull off something surprising there, but looking at the uphill road they are climbing, mostly alone, probably not. In Rogers Park, if you build it they probably won’t come, at least not during business hours. But, they will stop by to puke on the front door at 3:00am. Parking is not an issue for the Gang-Band Drug Dealers or their customers – they just pull up, curb service is alive and well in RP, and drive back to Evanston. Easy in, easy out.
I hear the Magees have gotten near nothing but lip-service from DevCorp. Parking, promised for all the businesses on Morse, is still “just a few days away” – the DevCorp Aria ….. sing it Kim …..It looks like the neighbors on either side of Cobblers Mall are less than helpful if not down right indifferent …. fools ….. Joe Moore and Kim Bares won’t show up until there is a photo op, so they can take some credit for “helping to make it all happen”. Looks like what they have really done - yesterday, today and tomorrow (if history is a judge) - is really less than nothing. Zip. Joe Moore style “business as usual”. I hear the great guys at the Morseland have actually helped the Magees – funny that - their only potential competition …. They can see the future. At least they hope they see the future …… I predict the Magees will eventually toss it in … something will break the camel’s back there on Morse Avenue. Couldn’t blame them …..
I hear Michael James is scared shitless that if it ever opens up the Morse Theater will smack the old Heartland – and Michael J and Katie Hogan - right into bankruptcy – actually right back into bankruptcy. That might piss off their silent White Knight “bail Mike out of the shit” partner Al G. a bit too ….. Maybe that’s why Joe Moore is letting the Coke Trade move to ground zero right in front of the best hope Morse Ave has as of today. All the while the cops act as late night life guards on Pratt Street Beach, chasing old men off the pier.
There appears to be no horse back cavalry riding over the hill to save the day …. Nowhere to be seen …. Just a sea of white “T’s” …. working the wall ….. movin’ product …..
Thanks again Joe – for all your community support. YOUR vision is ….. mysterious …….
RP Booster (extremely retired)
I have lived in RP for ten years and let me tell you--there has been vast changes occurring in the neighborhood. What you now experience on Morse is 1/3 of the negative intensity it once was--and what you still get there today was much wider spread throughout RP. Joe Moore has done very little to bring any of the changes about (he is primarily a blowheart and an idiot who is barely hanging onto his seat. Most of the changes have come through shutting down the big block apartments and converting them to condos. It has done two things--lessened the density of renters and increased the amount of people who own (and therefore tend to care enough to take some action). Some saavy and tough business owners are investing in the neighborhood and there are about ten times as many cool restaurants, bars, and coffee shops then there were ten years ago. Also, there are many more women with strollers, people tending their yards, people strolling on a summer afternoon, people of all stripes going to the Village North Theatre (crappy but hey--it does have great movies for cheap although I always wish it brought a few more artsy films to the area). Check out the changes on Devon Ave....yes in part because of the TIF, Jarvis square, and places around Loyola. Morse, like Howard, has a high concentration of crappy businesses, as well as a high density of slum landlord big block apartment buildings. On Morse, many happen to be right on the street or within half a block. Craig and many on this site do the neighborhood a service by bringing well needed attention to the blight and crime. Sometimes, however, many can get a bit cynical when what we need more is hope. There is much to be hopeful about and proud about in RP. Unfortunately, when you have an aldermen that is as dumb and self-interestd as ours...it happens a lot slower.
ok - I am new to this neighborhood, I admit, but reading these comments and this blog (which I think is a great blog by the way) I think that two things get confused. Walking around Morse, one is likely to encounter unpleasant people, who do not seem to have much respect for the place they are living at. Coming home from a run on Friday night (11 pm) I saw some gangbanger taking a leak against the fence of a house on the corner of Ashland and Farwell. When I went to the grocery store the other day, two drunks were yelling profanities at each other about whose dog could eat whose dog,... some people look away when you say hello, drunks on the street, etc etc, not pleasant, not good for the quality of living and all those things, but I think one needs to make a distinction between unpleasant and dangerous. Maybe I am to sure of myself and am invoking a gooning over myself, but none of these folks really scare me. This blog and some of the comments seem to imply that RP is dangerous and crime ridden, while in fact what this neighborhood is dealing with are quality of life issues and victimless crimes (small vandalism, drug use-sales, prostitution, drinking in public,....) rather than big crimes. It is my impression from looking at the crime stats in chicago that RP is not more dangerous for serious crimes than other neighborhoods, but don't quote me on that.
tjote
Absolutely correct and right on target. The stuff you were mentioning won't be tolerated in the suburbs because the cops there have a lot of time on their hands.
Chicago has 13,000 men and women to police 2 million people - they kind of expect you to shoo the drunk pissing on your porch away yourself and so do I. I personally don't want my cops yapping at a drunk that YOU could be yapping at, while a college kid from Loyola is getting sexually assaulted 3 blocks away, and by the time someone an call 911 it's a done deal. Did you ever think that if they weren't tied up with the bullshit calls about stuff you can easily fix yourself, they might be driving around and have the opp. to HEAR THE PERSON SCREAMING FOR HELP THEMSELVES and possibly prevent the crime from happening or getting worse!?!
When I listen to the scanner and hear some of the stuff people call 911 for it's laughable, but sad at the same time, because the cops have to respond. Like - there's a 10 year old kid in the park playing on the tree and he's going to break it. So you call the cops for this?
Go out there and act like an adult and TEACH the kid, that the smaller trees can't withstand their weight, you don't pull on them they may break, etc....if the kid keeps doing it, tell him to get the hell off the tree!!
Really it works, they're kids.They won't pull out a gun. It really ain't that serious. This is a paradise compared to other neighborhoods that you could buy into this cheaply.
You get what you pay for.
"You get what you pay for."
This attitude really irks me. Why is it that people should have to settle for poor conditions because they can't afford a grandiose house in the suburbs? I deeply apologize for being "only" middle-class. I guess that means I don't get to live in a safe environment; that's only for the rich people.
Tjote -- yes, the distinction between unpleasant and dangerous is very important to make. The entire premise of this blog suffers under this distinction. The goal of this blog is to CRIMINALIZE unpleasantness, and make VICTIMS (our utterly law-abiding selves, gifted as we are with impeccable taste and social grace) out of what you accurately call victimless crimes.
I probably COULD afford a house in some crappy suburb but I chose Rogers Park because it has lakefront, trees, restaurants, bars, live music, a university, transportation, a great grocery store on Morse, ALL within easy walking distance... yeah the alderman sucks but are these really "poor conditions"?
right on southevanston.
"are these really 'poor conditions'?"
Gangs, intimidation, sexual harassment, goonings, drugs, shootings?
Are these poor conditions? Do I have to answer that?
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