A Baltimore resident trying to restore order in his neighborhood speaks to a protester during clashes in Baltimore,
As the city of Baltimore
erupts into chaos tonight, here are a few facts about the city of Baltimore:
The population is 622,793.
There are approximately 16,000 abandoned homes.
An estimated 3,000 are homeless each night, an estimated 30,000 each year.
The Baltimore City high school graduation rate is 68.5%. The national average is 80%.
The median per capita income is $23,333. Nationally that is between $32,140-$39,509.
Many of the people that manage Baltimore City don't even live there:
-- Nearly one in 10 of the Police Department’s 3,459 employees lives across the state line, but fewer than 30 percent live inside city limits.
-- Among the Fire Department’s 1,702 employees, 11 percent live outside Maryland and just over a third reside in Baltimore City.
The chart has two different categories marked “mayor’s office,” with a total of 111 employees. It shows that 65 staffers, or 59 percent, are city dwellers. Sixteen live out of state, 21 in Baltimore County and four in Anne Arundel. The rest are scattered among Carroll, Harford, Montgomery and Prince George’s.
These facts aren't meant to in anyway condone the violence we are seeing in Baltimore, but it is important to understand the roots of this violence. Like a lot of cities in the United States, Baltimore has long lacked the resources and/or the political will to turn things around.
Finally, David Simon, creator of "The Wire"–the iconic show about poverty, drugs, violence and police brutality in Baltimore has a message tonight:
Yes, there is a lot to be argued, debated, addressed. And this moment, as inevitable as it has sometimes seemed, can still, in the end, prove transformational, if not redemptive for our city. Changes are necessary and voices need to be heard. All of that is true and all of that is still possible, despite what is now loose in the streets.
But now — in this moment — the anger and the selfishness and the brutality of those claiming the right to violence in Freddie Gray’s name needs to cease. There was real power and potential in the peaceful protests that spoke in Mr. Gray’s name initially, and there was real unity at his homegoing today. But this, now, in the streets, is an affront to that man’s memory and a dimunition of the absolute moral lesson that underlies his unnecessary death.
If you can’t seek redress and demand reform without a brick in your hand, you risk losing this moment for all of us in Baltimore. Turn around. Go home. Please.