She keeps getting elected because she’s in one of the poorest districts in the area. High crime, low income, filthy area where most are on complete government handouts. The only free enterprise going on in that area is selling drugs.
It was never wholly that way, at least for the 27 years I've lived here. Our part of her district is now 70% new "townhouses", on recycled 25' X 100' lots, that sell for $400K. Some of the fancier joints exceeding $1 mil. Lots of Beemers, Mercedes, Land Rovers and even a few Lincoln Town Cars like mine. Plenty of money here - and a lot of it going to John Faulk, her opponent.
And it's true that the "power structure" has repeatedly consigned the whole area -- even the upscale stores in Northwest Mall like Palais Royale offer less selection, poorer selection, and downmarket products; Penney's and Foley's (now Macy's) have shut, as have B. Dalton and Waldenbooks.
But the area's regentrifying, with lots of new houses being built in older neighborhoods from the 40's, so it's a footrace between detached-housing neighborhoods' stalwart performance (helped by their civic clubs and homeowners' associations and intelligent redevelopers) on the one hand, and the steady decay of existing apartment projects being shoved down-market by new construction (over 3000 apartments in one two-mile stretch in the last four years). The Section 8 apartment-dwellers are the criminals. We're starting to see them walking at night on the boulevards now -- individual men in wife-beaters and basketball jerseys, just walking. And every time a potential buyer drives through the area and sees those guys out walking .....
Oh, and the swells on Pardons and Paroles upstate keep dumping releasees here, and have just added a couple more "halfway houses" (call 'em "round-trip houses" instead, it'd be more accurate) and filled them with the state's dross and dumpings.
So the rich people have decided we're the dungpile of the state, but we keep refusing to conform to their expectations.
I’m betting they have great “civic responsibility” though, showing up at a rate of 110% to vote.
I’m betting they have great “civic responsibility” though, showing up at a rate of 110% to vote.
I’m betting they have great “civic responsibility” though, showing up at a rate of 110% to vote.