(Originally appeared in NewsMax.)
San Francisco is imploding, and they have no one to blame but themselves. The government and citizens turned on the police and the rule of law in an effort to virtue signal, and it came back to bite them.
Those actions just a few years ago started a ripple effect that even when San Franciscans realized the problem, they couldn’t stop it.
It had become an out-of-control snowball, rolling down a hill, growing larger and larger.
Now, we’re seeing, almost daily, stories of businesses leaving the city because of out-of-control crime.
Even this year, the city continues to see increases in violent crime – a 10 percent rise in homicides, a 14.7% rise in robberies, and a 5.4% rise in motor vehicle thefts – according to data from the city’s police department.
The problem is so bad that police often don’t have the manpower to respond to some incidents, particularly reports of shoplifting at stores.
Officers are forced to prioritize, and they often have more-pressing crimes requiring police presence.
The crime increase is also driving people out of the city.
It is not worth it for people to have deal with unchecked criminals and public drug use on the streets.
Those who can are leaving.
Both shoplifting and falling sales hurt profitability at stores, and so, businesses are following the citizens out of San Francisco.
Walgreens, AT&T, Saks 5th Avenue, Nordstrom, Amazon Go, Whole Foods are just a few of the stores either leaving entirely or reducing their presence in the city.
Safeway grocery stores are making an attempt to stay in the city by closing extra entrances and adding security gates to their San Francisco stores.
These are measures to delay shoplifters from leaving a store and, hopefully, discourage them from shoplifting in the first place.
It’s a yeoman’s effort, but it’s likely to fail because many of these corporate businesses train staff not to engage shoplifters because of liability issues.
So the gate may slow the shoplifter down, but if the store has no security personnel and no police to responding, the shoplifter will simply jump the gate.
So, when this effort fails, which is the most likely outcome, Safeway will probably follow the other businesses out of the city.
If a business can’t make a profit, or worse, loses money, what’s the point of remaining?
With people and businesses leaving, there goes much of the city’s tax base.
The city won’t see a proportional drop in the need for services because the people who remain will be some of those who need the most help or cause the most problems.
The once-beautiful San Francisco is becoming a wasteland.
It is a cautionary tale to other cities, particularly those large cities that pushed to defund their police forces.
They are seeing spikes in their crime rates because those actions told the criminals that there wouldn’t be consequences to their actions.
If they don’t want to follow in San Francisco’s footsteps, they need to take action quickly and decisively.
Police need to be allowed to do their jobs, enforce the law, and arrest criminals and suspected criminals.
When they do, they need to have district attorneys in office who will prosecute the criminals and not just drop the cases.
They need judges who will convict the criminals, not necessarily to the harshest limits, but certainly sentences that fit the crime.
It’s time for politicians to stop worrying about the feelings of criminals, and start worrying about the feelings and lives of law-abiding citizens.
Even then, it may be too late for some cities like San Francisco, although hopefully, this won’t be the case.
At best, it will take years for a “tough on crime” message to get out to criminals and have them believe it.
Michael Letts is the Founder and CEO of In-Vest USA, a national grassroots nonprofit organization helping to re-fund police by contributing thousands of bulletproof vests for police forces through educational, public relations, sponsorship, and fundraising programs. He also has over 30 years of law enforcement experience. Read More Michael Letts reports — Here.
