Video:Houston's 5th Ward drug scene + Fort Bend + Falfurrias

[Scott in Houston]

If you don't know your way around, the wards can be extremely bad news and a regular killbox for outsiders. Nothing to New Orleans or east LA areas though.

I would totally disagree about New Orleans. I spent 30 years there. My father spent 20 years pastoring an intercity mission church. There isn't an underbelly of New Orleans I haven't seen.
For a number of years I managed offices in New Orleans and Houston in ares that would be very similar in description. I never had a single issue at my New Orleans office. I eventually had to close down the Houston office due to theft, vandalism, and threats to the safety of my employees. I wouldn't hesitate to go anywhere in New Orleans - I refuse to so much as drive through Houston.

Ironic, because post-Katrina, Houston's crime shot up.
One of my best friends works for HPD in west Houston and his neighborhoods went to heck fast. He said, "These people are a special kind of mean and angry. Their gangs are nothing like what I've seen before."

Not far from nice homes in Memorial are Katrina evacuees, still getting subsidized by our taxes, and I see them weekly... and agree with his analysis.

As is your choice but it would be based on a very small sampling and would suggest that now I am even more correct as the worst of what lived in New Orleans before Katrina now lives in Houston.

That last part is definitely true. My personal sample set may be small, but buddy who patrols a large area in some 'gang task force' type organization of HPD, has agreed on a much wider level. He says he's not alone in his sentiments either.

Edit: correction, he doesn't patrol anymore. He's been a detective the last 2 or 3 years.

[jmra]

If you don't know your way around, the wards can be extremely bad news and a regular killbox for outsiders. Nothing to New Orleans or east LA areas though.

I would totally disagree about New Orleans. I spent 30 years there. My father spent 20 years pastoring an intercity mission church. There isn't an underbelly of New Orleans I haven't seen.
For a number of years I managed offices in New Orleans and Houston in ares that would be very similar in description. I never had a single issue at my New Orleans office. I eventually had to close down the Houston office due to theft, vandalism, and threats to the safety of my employees. I wouldn't hesitate to go anywhere in New Orleans - I refuse to so much as drive through Houston.

Ironic, because post-Katrina, Houston's crime shot up.
One of my best friends works for HPD in west Houston and his neighborhoods went to heck fast. He said, "These people are a special kind of mean and angry. Their gangs are nothing like what I've seen before."

Not far from nice homes in Memorial are Katrina evacuees, still getting subsidized by our taxes, and I see them weekly... and agree with his analysis.

As is your choice but it would be based on a very small sampling and would suggest that now I am even more correct as the worst of what lived in New Orleans before Katrina now lives in Houston.

That last part is definitely true. My personal sample set may be small, but buddy who patrols a large area in some 'gang task force' type organization of HPD, has agreed on a much wider level. He says he's not alone in his sentiments either.

Look at the crime reports out of NOLA and compare them with Houston. Facts speak for themselves. It's always easier to blame newcomers for your degrading society than it is to accept than your town was already hitting the skids before they got there.
NOLA has it's problems like anywhere, but anyone who thinks it's crime is anywhere near as bad as Houston simply doesn't know squat about NOLA. But since your mind has been decided by someone else's experiences (someone who obviously has little experience with NOLA itself) we will have to agree to disagree.

[Scott in Houston]

If you don't know your way around, the wards can be extremely bad news and a regular killbox for outsiders. Nothing to New Orleans or east LA areas though.

I would totally disagree about New Orleans. I spent 30 years there. My father spent 20 years pastoring an intercity mission church. There isn't an underbelly of New Orleans I haven't seen.
For a number of years I managed offices in New Orleans and Houston in ares that would be very similar in description. I never had a single issue at my New Orleans office. I eventually had to close down the Houston office due to theft, vandalism, and threats to the safety of my employees. I wouldn't hesitate to go anywhere in New Orleans - I refuse to so much as drive through Houston.

Ironic, because post-Katrina, Houston's crime shot up.
One of my best friends works for HPD in west Houston and his neighborhoods went to heck fast. He said, "These people are a special kind of mean and angry. Their gangs are nothing like what I've seen before."

Not far from nice homes in Memorial are Katrina evacuees, still getting subsidized by our taxes, and I see them weekly... and agree with his analysis.

As is your choice but it would be based on a very small sampling and would suggest that now I am even more correct as the worst of what lived in New Orleans before Katrina now lives in Houston.

That last part is definitely true. My personal sample set may be small, but buddy who patrols a large area in some 'gang task force' type organization of HPD, has agreed on a much wider level. He says he's not alone in his sentiments either.

Look at the crime reports out of NOLA and compare them with Houston. Facts speak for themselves. It's always easier to blame newcomers for your degrading society than it is to accept than your town was already hitting the skids before they got there.
NOLA has it's problems like anywhere, but anyone who thinks it's crime is anywhere near as bad as Houston simply doesn't know squat about NOLA. But since your mind has been decided by someone else's experiences (someone who obviously has little experience with NOLA itself) we will have to agree to disagree.

That's fine. The stats don't lie as you say... and the statistical jump in crime post-Katrina is undeniable. I'm not commenting on NOLA, just on what it did to Houston when they 'refugees' got here... the worst kind. It was well outside the standard deviation. I'm too lazy to google-foo, and not really concerned enough too either because in the end, it doesn't matter. It is what it is.

[llanite]

So this discussion made me curious - I go back and forth between both towns a lot and I have my own opinions, but here are some facts:

Code: Select all

City:               Population:             Violent Crime:            Murder:         Rape:             Robbery:
=================================================================================================================
Houston           2,177,273                10,106 (.464%)         105 (.005%)    302 (.014%)      4,612 (.212%)
New Orleans        362,874                 1,433 (.385%)           77 (.021%)      78 (.021%)      523  (.144%)

These are from this site:
http://www.fbi.gov/about-us/cjis/ucr/cr ... y.xls/view

and are the preliminary numbers for 2013 from the FBI.

I calculated the % crime per total population (in parenthesis).

While definitely a mixed result, the New Orleans murder rate is more than 4 times Houston's, and the rape rate is 33% higher per capita. For me, NO will retain its title of Mean Old Town in the south....

[llanite]

So, from the same source, here is the "Katrina Effect" on Houston's murder rate:

Code: Select all

		       Pop:	 Murder_Rate   Murder Rate as a % of Population
	2003	 2,041,081 	 278 	0.014%
	2004	 2,043,446 	 272 	0.013%
	2005	 2,045,732 	 334 	0.016%  Katrina
	2006	 2,073,729 	 377 	0.018%
	2007	 2,169,544 	 351 	0.016%
	2008	 2,238,895 	 294 	0.013%
	2009	 2,273,771 	 287 	0.013%
	2010	 2,280,859 	 269 	0.012%
	2011	 2,143,628 	 198 	0.009%
	2012	 2,177,273 	 217 	0.010%

You can see that the first full year after the hurricane saw a 28% jump in homicides, and the effect took about 3 years to fall back to the mean for the decade.

Note - these numbers are 2x the 2013 numbers in my previous posting because these are for the full year, where the 2013 report is only the first 6 months of the year.

Ok, thanks for helping me kill my lunch hour!

[Cedar Park Dad]

If you don't know your way around, the wards can be extremely bad news and a regular killbox for outsiders. Nothing to New Orleans or east LA areas though.

I would totally disagree about New Orleans. I spent 30 years there. My father spent 20 years pastoring an intercity mission church. There isn't an underbelly of New Orleans I haven't seen.
For a number of years I managed offices in New Orleans and Houston in ares that would be very similar in description. I never had a single issue at my New Orleans office. I eventually had to close down the Houston office due to theft, vandalism, and threats to the safety of my employees. I wouldn't hesitate to go anywhere in New Orleans - I refuse to so much as drive through Houston.

I'll bow to your greater knowledge.

[Scott in Houston]

Nice research!

[jmra]

So, from the same source, here is the "Katrina Effect" on Houston's murder rate:

Code: Select all

		       Pop:	 Murder_Rate   Murder Rate as a % of Population
	2003	 2,041,081 	 278 	0.014%
	2004	 2,043,446 	 272 	0.013%
	2005	 2,045,732 	 334 	0.016%  Katrina
	2006	 2,073,729 	 377 	0.018%
	2007	 2,169,544 	 351 	0.016%
	2008	 2,238,895 	 294 	0.013%
	2009	 2,273,771 	 287 	0.013%
	2010	 2,280,859 	 269 	0.012%
	2011	 2,143,628 	 198 	0.009%
	2012	 2,177,273 	 217 	0.010%

You can see that the first full year after the hurricane saw a 28% jump in homicides, and the effect took about 3 years to fall back to the mean for the decade.

Note - these numbers are 2x the 2013 numbers in my previous posting because these are for the full year, where the 2013 report is only the first 6 months of the year.

Ok, thanks for helping me kill my lunch hour!

Looks like it took 3 years for the Houston gangs to kill off the NOLA gangs.
I would expect to see this when any large group of lower income people is transplanted from one city to another. It is simply a matter of an incoming element trying to establish dominance over the existing element. The same would happen if you moved a similar sized population from any Texas city to another Texas city.

[Redneck_Buddha]

I knew Houston was in trouble after Katrina when I heard the stories of rudeness and ingratitude towards the volunteers and FREE gourmet food being served during the evacuation at the Astrodome.

[jmra]

So this discussion made me curious - I go back and forth between both towns a lot and I have my own opinions, but here are some facts:

Code: Select all

City:               Population:             Violent Crime:            Murder:         Rape:             Robbery:
=================================================================================================================
Houston           2,177,273                10,106 (.464%)         105 (.005%)    302 (.014%)      4,612 (.212%)
New Orleans        362,874                 1,433 (.385%)           77 (.021%)      78 (.021%)      523  (.144%)

These are from this site:
http://www.fbi.gov/about-us/cjis/ucr/cr ... y.xls/view

and are the preliminary numbers for 2013 from the FBI.

I calculated the % crime per total population (in parenthesis).

While definitely a mixed result, the New Orleans murder rate is more than 4 times Houston's, and the rape rate is 33% higher per capita. For me, NO will retain its title of Mean Old Town in the south....

These numbers don't mean much (especially the murder rate) unless you know who the victims are. In NOLA reported murders are almost always (few exceptions) drug related and BG on BG crime. I lived in NOLA for 30 years and was not acquainted with a single murder victim in that 30 years. Stay out of the slums and be just the slightest street wise and you simply don't have a lot to fear in NOLA.
That being said, I wouldn't ever trade my current small town environment for any city.