This is an excerpt from a letter David Everritt sent to the Governor, and copied me. It makes excellent points. I hope every single Pensacola City Council member and the Mayor take the time to READ this. #upsideoffllorida #ashtonhayward #FLGovScott #cityofpensacola #DowntownImprovementBoard #BrianSpencer #MeganBensonPratt #JewelCannadaWynn #LarryJohnson #michaeldcrews #NIABY #pnj #ricksblog #independentnews #weartv So living the life a North Hill Resident is not for the weak of heart! We dedicate our lives and our blood sweat and many, many tears into our historical homes. And we do it because we have passion for our home and our neighborhood. It is not easy being one of us but on the upside we are good neighbors and ferocious friends plus we are good for the city! We collectively spend millions of dollars per year in this economy to restore and maintain our properties. We do this with no help from the city or state. We do not receive any tax credits or grants to help us with these daunting tasks. (And like everyone else we then we get TAXED for our efforts!!! J) The money comes from the jobs we work…the labor comes from the sweat from our brows and when we need help we hire local which continues to stimulate the economy…We spend our LIVES restoring this area and keeping it nice… and we do it without any encouragement from our government. We do it because we have a passion for our homes and our neighborhoods…We spend our money... we break our backs... we raise families we create jobs we participate in city events and support the arts, the restaurants and the stores downtown We Make A HUGE difference in the quality of live downtown! And because it is so important to us we vote in city government that will help us keep our area safe. Another challenge of living in the historical district, other than the back breaking work and the constant need for upkeep is that we lose money another way… we have to contend with crime. We have a lot of foot traffic in the area… we have our bikes, grills, porch furniture and anything accidently left in our cars stolen. Collective lose thousands of dollars a month to theft. We do work together as a neighborhood drag net taking pictures of shady characters walking in our neighborhood casing our houses cars and even recently one creeper was photographed ogling the neighborhood children in the park! We all are on the North Hill face book and we get any updates of break-ins and any descriptions…we all try to look after each other as best we can but we are always being plagued by people that feel they are privileged to take our belongings that we had to save our hard earned money in order to buy. “The only thing you have to do to make a nice neighborhood into a Ghetto….is Nothing.” About a year ago I had the privilege to be featured on a Pensacola’s Young Professionals web TV episode along with Sheriff David Morgan. We were both talking about what it takes to turn a nice neighborhood into a ghetto. Sherriff Morgan talked about the “Broken Window Principal” where one house goes to seed and becomes an “Attractive Nuisance” this Attractive Nuisance brings non desirables like a magnet collects rusty nails. When vagrants get used to being in your area they start breaking in and camping out and trashing the place…then the people that keep their houses nice and yards clean do not want to live next to this now rundown property and they move to a more desirable area, and because no one wants the house next to the bad house now there are two attractive nuisances side by side …and that is how the cancer of social blight sets in…and it slowly grows and grows until the entire neighborhood is bad. That is how it works…One bad influence creates the next and the next and the next… Everyone knows that history repeats itself…Do you look at a bad neighborhood and just figure it was built that way??? When it was new and shiny it was cared for and was kept nice until the apathy of the neighbors lets the area slowly decline. Well that is what happens to neighborhoods that are not proactive in protecting their homes, one day they just wake up and ask “What Happened??” What does it take to get a blighted area nice again?? Don’t get me started!! (Oh oh…Too Late “pulls out soap box”)!!
Posted on: Wed, 19 Mar 2014 13:48:34 +0000
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