Santa Ana Under the Gun to Confront Gang Violence

We’ve got to keep the heat on.

It’s getting to the point where I don’t care if the city of Santa Ana thinks it’s being unfairly typecast or not. In the grand scheme of things, it is being unfairly portrayed as an outlaw city, a frontier battle zone in the midst of civilization where marauding and murder are the order of the day.

But to its residents, I can only sadly say, that’s the perception. You’re in danger of losing control of your city.

It almost doesn’t matter that for every gangbanger out joy riding with an Uzi there are hundreds of law-abiding citizens holding down jobs or raising their kids or, if you’re a kid yourself, finding a way to avoid being ensnared in the gang trap.

No, it doesn’t matter because gang violence is becoming synonymous with Santa Ana. I can understand the local merchants or the City Council not wanting to say so, but that’s the view from the outside.

Things are past the point where the mayor or other city officials can’t talk, or don’t want to talk, about gang problems for fear that it reinforces a bad image for the city. The image is already there, glued on tight.

That’s why we’ve got to keep hammering away, so gang violence doesn’t become a cliche or just taken for granted as “the way things are” in Santa Ana.

After all, it isn’t like gang warfare is the city’s genetic curse. After the most recent senseless killing Wednesday night, in which a man was shot in the face after playing pickup basketball outside Santa Ana High School, neighbors talked about how just a decade ago they didn’t feel the fear they know today.

Talk to former gang members now in their 30s or early 40s, and they’ll recall how their skirmishes of a generation ago were almost always fought with fists, not automatic weapons. Today, Santa Ana is in danger of becoming known as Orange County’s sister city to West Beirut or Belfast.

Nor is it enough anymore to hide behind the excuse that only a small percentage of the people are ruining the city. That’s no more comforting than saying that most of a person’s vital organs are functioning perfectly except for the diseased heart that’s killing him.

So we’ve got to keep hammering away before Santa Ana in the ‘90s becomes an urban wasteland, barricaded off from the rest of Orange County.

Yeah, I know what you’re saying--long on rhetoric, short on solutions.

Guilty as charged, but even some rhetoric is better than nothing. Who’s out front consistently leading the fight against gang violence in Santa Ana?

Who or what is the equivalent of Sheriff Brad Gates trumpeting the need for a new jail or Supervisor Tom Riley of yesteryear pushing for a new airport or Laguna Beach environmentalists fighting tooth and nail over stopping a tollway?

Where was City Hall after the Wednesday night shooting, either to condemn a citizen getting gunned down on a school playground or to tell the rest of the city what was being done about it?

Police Chief Paul Walters stepped forward--even though he was on vacation--to vow that the killers would be caught.

But where was Mayor Dan Young or Mayor Pro Tem Miguel Pulido, the city’s top two elected officials?

Rest easy, guys--nobody is blaming you for gang violence. We know it’s not your fault. What we’re looking for is some leadership for a city that wants to know whether it has a future free of fear.

We’ve seen you proceed with all due diligence in cracking down on occupancy ordinances and homeless people in the Civic Center.

We even remember last year’s highly publicized gang sweeps after a series of shootings had the city on edge. What happened to them? Your city is on edge again.

Occupancy problems and swap meets and the homeless are easier to get at, I know, but how about applying the same gusto and public attention to the real threat to your town--a citizen’s basic concern about playing in the park, walking to school, sitting in the living room at night?

You are absolutely right, Mr. Mayor: Santa Ana is getting a bum rap. The gang problem is way too complicated to be discussed this glibly. I know the city is concerned.

But whatever you’re doing isn’t working. Gang cases went up 30% in your town last year from the year before.

So we’re going to keep pounding away at you until we quit reading stories about:

* Men getting shot after playing basketball on public playgrounds.

* Couples getting shot while sitting in their back yards at night.

* Teachers getting shot walking out of school buildings.

I hope you think I’ve been as unfair and unreasonable as possible. If I could think of another way to get your goat, I would.

Come on, Santa Ana. Get mad.

Get so mad you’re not going to take it anymore.

Get so mad that you take back your city.