Jason Schroeder, ‘Stand Up Redding’ change-maker
I remember driving back from our first “Stand Up, Redding!” meeting in March of this year and thinking: “Wouldn’t it be powerful if we could connect all of our Neighborhood Watch groups throughout Redding?”
If we have an interconnected web throughout the city, we will be able to not just shoo crime from our neighborhoods and into the next one. We might be able to get it out of the city altogether.
At our “Stand Up, Redding!” meetings we have been talking about how we need to make our neighborhood a high-risk place for criminals to do business.
I think it is time we make it known that the city of Redding is a high-risk place to be a criminal. If you are committing crimes, we will be watching you. You can’t just take your sex trafficking operation from Olive Avenue to Park Marina Drive and go unnoticed. We will still have someone watching you at the new location.
And that is the key. Instead of feeling like the criminals are watching us, we need to make them feel as if the good citizens of this city are watching them.
The beautiful thing is that, this doesn’t require a sales tax increase. It doesn’t require a vote. It doesn’t require more police officers, It doesn’t require someone in Sacramento or Washington, DC, to pay attention to our local problems.
We can do this on our own, without having to wait for folks at the city, state or federal government to figure out the politics of taking action against the crime on our streets.
So on Aug. 6 there will be a meeting for those neighborhoods that want to join with “Stand Up, Redding!” and fight to take back our city.
The focus will be on the strategies that we have used in our neighborhood to identify and remove crime from our area, and how to establish an effective communication system among neighborhood leaders.
Please go to weaver2014.com/stand-up-redding and download the Stand Up Start Up Guide to receive more information about the Aug. 6 meeting.
Brent Weaver and his team have gone out of their way to support our efforts and will be facilitating the meeting to discuss the Stand Up Redding process and strategies.
I will discuss some surprising things that are working to make major changes happen in our neighborhood. And they may not be what you think.
Thank you and keep Standing Up!
Jason Z. Schroeder and his family live near downtown Redding where they’ve taken a stand against crime in their neighborhood.
Jason Z. Schroeder is a renowned master craftsman guitar builder. He lives and works in Redding where he is a father, husband, and, most recently, a community activist who’s helped drive crime from his neighborhood.
Click here to read The Schroeder Story, about his guitar-making craft, which includes creating instruments for such musicians as Fleetwood Mac guitarist Neale Heywood.
