If you’re a newcomer, we have so much to offer you here in Redding.
You can start by enjoying the beautiful Sacramento River Trail where you can risk your life enjoying the great outdoors. Yep, you may stumble onto a real drug deal gone wild. Then, maybe you can use one of the many newly renovated (after arson) restrooms.
From the Sacramento River Trail, this only-in-Redding view of bridges framing Lassen Peak.
Head downtown town for an evening of fine dining. Don’t let the pile of hot human fecal mater or the smell of urine curb your enthusiasm. Make certain your flip flops can handle stepping on a heroin syringe.
Do you like sports? Well, almost any night of the week you can head over to Four Corners (Churn Creek Road and Hartnell Avenue) where you can catch grown-ass men on your kids’ BMX bikes with full backpacks full of your shit!
Yes, just watch them go, networking their crime ring on the very smartphones you bought them. It’s like X Games, but the “X” is for X Con.
Man, with that speed and agility you’d think they’d have a job; but not in this town. Crime is what pays here in Parolee Paradise.
Do you like crime dramas? Look no further. Check out our local news and you’ll learn there’s literally a stabbing, shooting, beating, raping, etc. every episode.
During the day head to one of our unSafeway stores to get an autograph from one of “Redding’s Most Wanted” and then watch them fill their baskets with merchandise and leave without paying. All day long.
But don’t you try this, though, because you have a job and money so you will be busted and pay a steep penalty. There’s no equal justice under the law here in Parolee Paradise. You run a red light, you pay $500. But if you’re a parolee, you can steal a car, and rip off groceries, alcohol, tools and electronics, and even if you are arrested, you’ll be back out on the streets in just under an hour.
That’s OK, folks, because after you are already taxed all to hell by the state, you can now subsidize these losers’ crimes by paying higher prices for your retail goods, to compensate for the stores’ losses. Oh, and another reason you’ll pay higher prices for your retail items is that those stores now have to cover their security guards’ wages (even though the security guards really can’t do anything, because of, you know, liability).
Then, when you get home you can sink a few grand into your own personal security system, LifeLock identity-theft insurance, surveillance cameras, auto-theft insurance, security gates, alarms, home-theft insurance, and on and on and on.
But don’t worry. Our city leaders will print some posters, maybe host a brownie bake-sale fundraiser or a special event where we all pick up trash together as a community on the weekend. Yep, works like a charm … works like a charm. Maybe they’ll hand out balloons that have catchy slogans like, “Stealing hurts feelings,” or, “God helps those who help themselves, so lock your doors.“
You could burn up your evening at city council meetings listening to the same do-nothing lingo, you know, “Our hands are really tied,” and “We’ll think about that possibility,” and “Thank you for your input,” as they act genuinely concerned.
In case you’ve missed it, we’ve made national news a few times lately, and it’s not for being the Happiest Place on Earth.
Have you had enough yet; maybe before MS13 gets the word about this gold mine and sets up shop here and the new norm will be who gets gang-raped and has their head sawed off on live video today?
Let’s quit pussyfooting around and get serious.
What if a few hundred pissed-off contractors, mechanics and other business owners – people who are tired of it; people who want to take our town back – said we’d had enough? What if we joined forces and took action?
As an aside, my cousin is the person who sends drug dealers, parolees, etc. to Redding from Nevada when they can’t afford their HUD rent, or if they can’t afford medical care. That’s the kind of plan we need, right?
Here’s one idea: What if we volunteers rented a couple of box vans and starting relocating these bastards ourselves? A nice clean sweep would take 30 to 60 days, tops, and it would send a nice message to these parolee visitors: You are unwelcome here.
We’d be helping law enforcement, whose asses are on the line every damn day busting these assholes, only to watch our courts let them go. The men and women in blue, who I have the utmost respect for, have their hands tied. Let’s give them a hand.
Also, any damn outreach organization, friggin’ mission, or state-run, county-run handout organization that gets their palm greased for having parolees come into our community should be stopped with all our might.
Do not feed the bears!
By the way, if you are one of these bleeding hearts who suffers from Intention Deficit Disorder, get a grip. Quit giving handouts to these bastards. The largest majority choose this lifestyle, and I have plenty of stories to back that up.
You want to save a parolee? You house them, you live with them, you sleep with them! Step up and quit trying to give them the shirt off of someone else’s back!
If we do not take this town back, then one day it will be your turn to have something horrible happen to you at the hands of one of these criminals.
I’ve had my turn a few times lately, and believe me when I say it will change your life in a split second. Trust me about this.
One option is we can all move to Idaho, I guess, and let this place tank. But I’ve been here since ’78, and have come to know and love many in this town.
Right now your chance of being the victim of a violent crime in this town are about 1 in 100, or maybe it’s already happened to you.
Either way, the good people of this city have got to step up, because, make no mistake, we are on our own. Ignoring that fact is naive. We could keep ignoring things, or we could get real and fix this now.
If you want to get into the fetal position during a bear attack, go ahead. For me, that will be my very last resort.
Al Mires is a 55-year-old Redding musician and business owner. He was born in New Jersey, and has lived in Redding since 1978.
