Re: MacLean's Crime-ranking absence noted by police, mayor, The Citizen, Dec. 6).
Let it never be said that Prince George is without tradition. Three prominent ones, coming each year like clockwork and reflected in Citizen articles and letters-to-the-editor include: the spring ritual of pothole-grousing (never mind that the complaints begin well before it is practical to do repair work); the late autumn onset of bitching about snow removal (as if each year residents have to learn anew that, yes, Virginia, the white stuff does come here in the North); and of course there's the MacLean's magazine crime survey, which automatically prompts whomever is mayor (with an accompanying police chorus) to sing fortissimo defiance of those nasty little things called the facts.
But wait: is it possible that that cruel publication would deny us our yearly fun, fail to issue its rankings thereby leaving our civic leaders with nothing to carp about? Fear not: no-show is just as newsworthy, it seems, for Mayor Green. Undeterred, she and the local police are back on their tiny pedestals, vociferously declaiming MacLean's survey, even if it doesn't come out. This year their angle is to advocate that the magazine should drill its analysis down into the appalling crime rates in communities of 10,000 or even less. That way, if there's just one assault in some hamlet of 50 people in the middle of nowhere, that veritable little nest of iniquity can push Prince George from its unwanted top spot.
Of course Mayor Green, in her blustering, seems to have missed the key word in the annual survey title, "most dangerous cities." While there is no fixed definition of the distinction between a city, a town and even smaller conurbations, fact is that most of those little places the mayor wants included, as cover for our own city's high crime rate, are not out wildly marketing themselves for business development and, to put it bluntly, no one really gives a rat's derriere about their rates of law-breaking. But, still, it is harsh of Maclean's to hold back on us like this, especially at this festive time of year, forcing our leaders into pre-emptive denial mode. It just isn't as much fun (or as much of a distraction from real municipal issues), is it, when the big bad outsiders aren't there to scream at anymore?
Norman Dale
Prince George
