Damn

[BlueStreak]

I've just returned from a trip to lovely Warren, Ohio. Hmmm.........

Suburbs of the Youngstown/Warren Metropolitan area seem to be shining up a bit. Actual growth and new businesses and stuff like that. I was surprised at Niles, it's actually looking like a nice place to live, once again.

The cities themselves? Not so much. The west end of Warren is shockingly run down, all sorts of boarded up businesses and abandoned, delapidated homes. Tod Avenue at night is a friggin' zoo. Hookers and drug dealers operating right out in the open. The feds swept through Warren back in April/May and arrested dozens of people in a narcotics sting. Dealers, suppliers, traffickers.......their faces filled an entire page in Sundays paper. Everything from small time marijuana & crack dealers to two women who were charged with wholesale distribution of heroin. Supposedly, the two are major league and face 20 years in prison.

The Warren ploice department is broke and down to 2 officers on patrol for each shift. Not good for a city with ~40,000 residents.

My hometown, Newton Falls, has scarcely changed for better or worse in the last 20-30 years.

Dave