Safety News Conference

SAFER-NEIGHBORHOODS – Mayor Kelly Girtz has worked on large-scale revitalization projects for Athens-Clarke County neighborhoods. With wholesale renovations to the “Pauldoe” and Bethel Midtown neighborhoods, crime has gone down dramatically. By Catherine Vrolijk 370 words, photos, video.

Kelly Girtz addresses that all the preventative measures could still use additional resources to make the greatest public safety gains. This includes health, education and housing. (Photos/Catherine Vrolijk)

Mayor Kelly Girtz explained his solutions for solving public safety and crime issues in Athens-Clarke County at a student news conference last week. On Friday morning, Kelly Girtz joined journalism students at Grady College of Journalism and Mass Communication’s Studio 100 for a news conference covering many topics relating to public safety in the Athens area.

One of the topics brought up was supporting local neighborhoods. Girtz believes that not only is the work of the police department important when it comes to crime, but also people’s “lived experiences.” These experiences are created by emphasizing improvements in their communities.

In Athens, Girtz said large-scale renovation and revitalization efforts have been put in place to “better enrich neighborhoods”, bringing park and public spaces to more of the population. Girtz said they have already seen success of these revitalization efforts in the “Pauldoe” neighborhood, after doubling the number of existing beds and even adding new beds.

This veteran neighborhood now with more resources Girtz explained, has seen the population triple as well as crime rates going down dramatically. Girtz said, “These are young people, children and families who now wake up in the morning and they walk out their front door and they don’t just see people who are struggling, they don’t just see people who are desperate.

They see people who are coming off to class, who are going into work, who are professionals. Girtz said, “When communities take part in enriching and healthy activities, the benefits are immense, especially for the youth of the community”. Girtz wants to infuse these opportunities into young lives because he said they can “prevent those future crimes” and are going to “make better lives for those young people.”

In addition to these efforts, the city is also increasing access to public amenities over the city. There have been park and trail enhancements to the East Athens and Lay Parks, and Girtz plans to continue these improvements with Gaines School Rd. corridor and West Athens next.

This was the very first article for this class and honestly was very difficult for me because I had never done this type of writing before. I learned that I needed to format with graphs as well as avoiding bias language.