Copyright 1994 The Times Mirror Company Los Angeles Times April 17, 1994, Sunday, Home Edition SECTION: Part A; Page 1; Column 4; National Desk HEADLINE: CLINTON CALLS FOR STEPS TO RID PROJECTS OF GUNS; CRIME: THE PRESIDENT PROPOSES USING METAL DETECTORS AND REGULAR FRISKING. A CHICAGO COURT RULING BLOCKS SWEEPS IN SEARCH OF WEAPONS. BYLINE: By DAVID G. SAVAGE, TIMES STAFF WRITER DATELINE: WASHINGTON In an effort to get guns out of gang-infested public housing projects, President Clinton called Saturday for installing metal detectors at the entrances to crime-ridden buildings and for regular frisking of people who might be carrying weapons. "Every law-abiding American, rich or poor, has the right to raise children without fear of criminals terrorizing where they live," Clinton said in his weekly radio address. The new Administration policy on guns in public housing came in response to a ruling by a federal judge in Chicago that blocked authorities from conducting sweeps of apartments in search of weapons. Such mass searches without probable cause violate the Fourth Amendment's ban on unreasonable searches and seizures, U.S. District Judge Wayne R. Anderson said in his April 7 ruling. But Administration officials said public housing authorities may take a series of strict steps to seize weapons without violating the Constitution. They also said the vast majority of residents in public housing support stronger gun-control measures. "The residents have requested these sweeps," Housing and Urban Development Secretary Henry G. Cisneros said at a White House briefing Saturday. "They are nearly desperate with the conditions as they are." Cisneros outlined five steps that officials in Chicago and elsewhere can use for regaining control of their buildings from gangs and drug dealers: * Put armed police and metal detectors at the entrances to buildings. "It is essential to get control of the lobbies," Cisneros said. Some buildings in Chicago use "rent-a- cops" who are intimidated by armed gang members, he said. * Erect fences around public housing projects. This simple step has cut crime by 40% in some cities and put a stop to rampant drug dealing in the projects, he said. * Conduct weapon searches in common areas of the projects, such as grounds and stairwells. While the Fourth Amendment generally bars police from entering a person's apartment without a warrant, it does not bar them from searching for weapons in hallways, stairwells or vacant units. * Frisk suspicious-looking individuals for weapons. The Supreme Court has said repeatedly that officers can "pat down" a person they believe may be involved in a crime to see if the suspect has a gun or knife. * Urge tenants to sign consent forms that permit police searches for weapons. Cisneros said public housing tenants are required to permit inspections as part of maintenance procedures, and they might be willing to permit regular, unit-by-unit searches to rid their buildings of drugs and weapons. "The residents could vote on this. That would be an important factor in a court test," he said. Still, the notion of a majority-mandated consent could pose legal problems. In his ruling, Anderson said tenants who favor unit-by-unit inspections cannot vote to "suspend their neighbors' rights" against unwanted searches. In past decisions, the Supreme Court has upheld searches of a person's home or property when the owner consented in advance, but the justices have stressed that consent must be voluntary. Nonetheless, Assistant Atty. Gen. William Bryson suggested that public housing tenants could be required to permit regular searches of their units as part of their lease agreements. "Under some circumstances, it can be a condition of the lease," Bryson told reporters. "We can square this with the Fourth Amendment. We are dealing with an emergency situation." In their comments, Administration officials emphasized that they were focusing on crime-ridden housing units where gangs have taken control and where shootings are routine. The new anti-crime steps "would not be appropriate for a senior citizens center in Sarasota that hasn't had any crime problems," Bryson said. In his radio address, Clinton said crime and violence in public housing projects is taking away the basic rights of the children who grow up there. "They include the right to go out to the playground and the right to sit by an open window, the right to walk to the corner without fear of gunfire, the right to go to school safely in the morning and the right to celebrate your 10th birthday without coming home to bloodshed and terror," the President said. Chicago has 67 high-rise public housing buildings in a four-mile stretch of South State Street, Cisneros said, and gangs have taken control of several buildings. In the past week, he said, there were 15 shootings and five deaths in these complexes. Young drug dealers, using high-powered rifles from the upper floors, pick off their rivals walking below, he said. The get-tough policies announced Saturday "are targeted to Chicago, but the same approach will be available to other communities," Cisneros said. GRAPHIC: Photo, COLOR, HUD Secretary Henry G. Cisneros details crime-fighting policy. Associated Press Copyright 1994 U.S. Newswire, Inc. U.S. Newswire April 18, 1994 Radio Address by President Clinton to the Nation on Saturday, April 16 CONTACT: White House Office of the Press Secretary, 202-456-2100 DATELINE: WASHINGTON, April 16 Following is the text of a radio address by President Clinton to the nation on Saturday, April 16: The Roosevelt Room 10:06 A.M. EDT THE PRESIDENT: Good morning. This week we joined in sorrow for those who lost their lives in the downing of two of our helicopters over Iraq. I want to begin by expressing, again, my condolences to the loved ones of those who died. They gave their lives in a high cause -- providing comfort to Kurdish victims of Sadaam Hussein's brutal regime -- and we honor the sacrifice of those brave individuals. Today I want to talk about one of the greatest threats we face right here at home -- the threat of crime in our communities. In 1991, I visited the Rockwell Gardens in the ABLA Housing Projects in Chicago where I saw firsthand what happens to our children who live too long in the shadow of fear. Dozens of children rushed out to greet me, eager to have someone to tell their stories to. They talked of gunshots and drug dealers, of late-night knocks at their doors and hallways where they dared not stray. Many of their stories had a common theme -- their childhoods were being stolen from them. Vince Lane, the head of the Chicago Housing Authority, is a genuine hero to these children. He's trying to show the children that someone cares. To help, he put into effect a search and sweep policy to clean out Chicago's public housing communities, to find weapons, to get people out of those housing projects who didn't belong, to find drugs. But just over a week ago a federal district judge declared Vince Lane's search and sweep policy unconstitutional. Every law-abiding American, rich or poor, has the right to raise children without the fear of criminals terrorizing where they live. That's why, as soon as I heard about the court's decision, I instructed Secretary of Housing and Urban Development Henry Cisneros and Attorney General Janet Reno to devise a constituitonal effective way to protect the residents of America's public housing communities. Secretary Cisneros and Attorney General Reno moved quickly. Today I am announcing a new policy to help public housing residents take back there homes. First, at my direction, Secretary Cisneros is in Chicago to provide emergency funds for enforcement and prevention in gang- infested public housing. We'll put more police in public housing, crack down on illegal gun trafficking, and fill vacant apartments where criminals hide out. And we'll provide more programs like midnight basketball leagues to help our young people say no to gangs and guns and drugs. Second, we will empower residents to build safe neighborhoods, and we'll help to organize tenant patrols to ride the elevators and look after the public spaces in these high-rise public housing units. Finally, we're going to work with residents in high- crime areas to permit the full range of searches that the Constitution does allow -- in common areas, in vacant apartments and in circumstances where residents are in immediate danger. We'll encourage more weapons frisks of suspicious persons, and we'll ask tenant associations to put clauses in their leases allowing searches when crime conditions make it necessary. This new policy honors the principles of personal and community responsibility at the very heart of this administration's efforts. It also shows all Americans that their government can move swiftly and effectively on their behalf. Now we must move swiftly on the crime bill before Congress. The bill provides the right balance of protection, punishment and prevention. It will put 100,000 more police officers on the streets for community policing efforts that work. It will make three strikes and you're out the law of the land and provide money for new prisons. And it will pay for a wide variety of prevention programs to give our young people a future they can say yes to. This is a crucial moment in the crime bill debate. It's time to tell Congress you've waited long enough for comprehensive national crime legislation; that you don't want political posturing or frivolous amendments, and instead, you need help to take back your communities. This crime bill is for all our people, but nobody needs it more than the people like the mother of three who lives right here in Washington. A week ago, this 33-year-old mother came home after celebrating her ten-year-old daughter's birthday to find a gang of gunmen ransacking her apartment. The mother had one plea for the intruders: "If you believe in God, please don't shoot my children. Shoot me." The reply was cold and terrifying. "I don't believe in God," said one of the gunmen. Then he shot her daughter dead. Before the gunfire ceased, another child and the mother were both shot, and her three-year-old son witnessed the whole thing. The sad fact is, the police now believe the shootings were carried out by youths who hang out in the very apartment complex where that mother was trying to raise her children. There are many rights that our laws and our Constitution guarantee to every citizen, but that mother and her children have certain rights we are letting slip away. They include the right to go out to the playground, and the right to sit by an open window; the right to walk to the corner without fear of gunfire; the right to go to school safely in the morning; and the right to celebrate your tenth birthday without coming home to bloodshed and terror. The crime bill will help us take back those rights for all of our people. So will our new policy to protect public housing residents. We must decide we will not tolerate more tragedies like that mother's. When we do that, together, we can replace our children's fear with hope. Thanks for listening. Copyright 1994 News World Communications, Inc. The Washington Times April 17, 1994, Sunday, Final Edition SECTION: Part A; Pg. A1 HEADLINE: Clinton proposes raids, searches in the projects BYLINE: Frank J. Murray; THE WASHINGTON TIMES ****HE EXPLAINS A NEW POLICY AIMED AT HELPING RESIDENTS "TAKE BACK THEIR HOMES"**** President Clinton said yesterday his administration has found a constitutional way to make limited sweep-searches of gang-ridden public housing projects to end "the fear of criminals terrorizing where they live." "Today I am announcing a new policy to help public-housing residents take back their homes," Mr. Clinton said in a radio speech that was quickly criticized by the American Civil Liberties Union. He said the plan would allow frightened tenants to agree with authorities and allow surprise searches without warrants in common areas, vacant apartments "and in circumstances where residents are in immediate danger." "We'll encourage more weapons frisks of suspicious persons. And we'll ask tenant associations to put clauses in their leases allowing searches when crime conditions make it necessary," Mr. Clinton said. Under the plan, security guards would be allowed to search people if they were simply suspected of involvement in criminal activity, sidestepping the time-consuming and often-futile process of seeking a court warrant. This strikes at the very core of ACLU fears, which is concerned that accused people will lose rights without due process. Housing or local police also could enter an apartment to execute an arrest warrant if the fugitive lives there and officers believe he is inside. In taking a position rare for a Democratic president, Mr. Clinton has argued that the rights of law-abiding tenants are being so trampled they need immediate help. "Every law-abiding American, rich or poor, has the right to raise children without fear of criminals terrorizing them where they live," Mr. Clinton said. The Republican response, delivered by Sen. Janes M. Jeffords of Vermont, did not specifically refer to the housing-project searches, but he said, "When kids are packing pistols rather than lunches to school, we've all got a problem." The new policy is meant to be national but will be aimed for now at high-rise, public-housing projects in Chicago. Mr. Clinton said he was making good on his promise to respond to a federal court ruling that stopped Chicago Housing Authority (CHA) from cracking down on gang- related crime in a four-mile strip of public-housing projects where tenants are said to be terrified by unchecked crime. Vince Lane, head of the CHA, instituted an apartment-to-apartment search policy without warrants to hunt illegal drugs and weapons and to oust criminals squatting in vacant apartments. Those searches were ruled unconstitutional by a judge who made it clear that the CHA could try other methods to search that might pass muster. Mr. Clinton told Attorney General Janet Reno and Housing and Urban Development Secretary Henry Cisneros he wanted a solution to the problem within two weeks, and he announced the plan yesterday. "We're going to work with residents in high-crime areas to permit the full range of searches that the Constitution does allow," Mr. Clinton said yesterday, adding that his action shows that the government can move swiftly on behalf of a beleaguered public. The president recalled 1991 visits to some of the affected housing projects. "I saw first-hand what happens to our children who live too long in the shadow of fear," he said of one visit, during which children told of their experiences with drug dealers, shootings and other crimes. "Their childhoods were being stolen from them," Mr. Clinton said. "Vince Lane . . . put into effect a search-and-sweep policy to clean up Chicago's public-housing communities, to find weapons, to get people out of those housing projects who didn't belong, to find drugs," the president said. "We'll put more police in public housing, crack down on illegal gun trafficking and fill vacant apartments where criminals hide out, and we'll provide more programs like midnight basketball leagues to help our young people say no to gangs and guns and drugs," he said. Fences may be built, identification cards issued to tenants and metal detectors installed at entrances, where guards would search packages and clothing. "We believe this will pass constitutional muster," Mr. Cisneros said in a White House briefing. "A lot of work went into drafting a policy that would pass a court test." GRAPHIC: Photo (color), HUD Secretary Henry Cisneros outlines details of the administration's new policies aimed at fighting crime in public housing projects., By AP Proprietary to the United Press International 1994 April 14, 1994, Thursday, BC cycle SECTION: Washington News HEADLINE: Reno supports consent forms for gun control DATELINE: WASHINGTON, April 14 U.S. Attorney General Janet Reno said Thursday that residents of public housing projects can sign consent forms to allow police to make weapons searches without warrants. A federal judge in Chicago, Illinois, has blocked warrantless gun sweeps of federally subsidized housing by the Chicago Housing Authority, but Reno said ''consensual searches can still go forward.'' The attorney general's comments came after President Bill Clinton on Monday asked Reno and Housing and Urban Development Secretary Henry Cisneros to look into constitutional ways to get guns out of the projects. Reno said she's given no official report to the president, though she talked to the White House Wednesday. She said Justice Department officials would be meeting with officials from the Department of Housing and Urban Development Thursday afternoon to discuss effective ways of dealing with the problem. Cisneros was in Chicago earlier this week, where the violence in some projects has reached a boiling point. The secretary told Clinton by phone that he was in a Chicago housing project where he had spent the night, and there were about 20 confiscated guns on a table in front of him. Cisneros told the president there were 15 shootings and five deaths last weekend in Chicago. (Written by Michael Kirkland in Washington) Copyright 1994 Chicago Tribune Company Chicago Tribune April 17, 1994 Sunday, CHICAGOLAND FINAL EDITION SECTION: NEWS; Pg. 1; ZONE: C HEADLINE: CLINTON UNVEILS A SWEEPS PLAN FOR CHA; SEARCHES TO BE TIED TO LEASES BYLINE: By Mitchell Locin, Tribune Staff Writer. Tribune reporter Jeffrey Bils contributed to this article. DATELINE: WASHINGTON President Clinton told the nation Saturday that he never has forgotten the conditions he saw nor the residents who had to endure them during his 1991 tour of Chicago's Rockwell Gardens and ABLA housing developments. They are memories that struck home for the president April 7 when he heard that a federal judge in Chicago had prohibited police from sweeping unannounced through CHA apartments looking for weapons, a ruling that followed a rash of shootings in the city's Robert Taylor Homes. Informed of the ruling while on the road selling his health care plan, Clinton immediately ordered Atty. Gen. Janet Reno and Housing and Urban Development Secretary Henry Cisneros to develop an aggressive policy to attack the violence and also pass constitutional muster. Clinton was so eager to push the policy that he briefly discussed the possibility of making a surprise stop in Chicago, though he ultimately decided that the visit would be too disruptive. Nine days after the court decision, the president on Saturday devoted his weekly radio address to unveiling a new national policy for protecting public housing residents, using Chicago as a model. Among the most prominent proposals: Leases should include a clause allowing apartments to be searched. Clinton called for a combination of tougher law enforcement, including aggressive use of sweeps and searches as far as the Constitution will allow, and more resources for police and public housing managers and tenants. In his comments, he recalled his visit to Rockwell Gardens, 2517 W. Adams St., and ABLA, 1200 W. 14th St., in 1991 when he was a little-known Arkansas governor. "I saw firsthand what happens to our children who live too long in the shadow of fear," Clinton said. "They talked of gunshots and drug dealers, of late-night knocks at their doors, and hallways where they dared not stray," he said. "Many of their stories had a common theme: Their childhoods were being stolen from them." Clinton also praised the man who conducted his 1991 tour, CHA Chairman Vincent Lane, as a "genuine hero" to children. Though Clinton selected Cisneros, the former mayor of San Antonio, over Lane for secretary of Housing and Urban Development, Clinton frequently has cited Lane's efforts to improve conditions in public housing. Lane "put into effect a search-and-sweep policy to clean out Chicago's public housing communities, to find weapons, to get people out of those housing projects who didn't belong, to find drugs," Clinton said. After U.S. District Judge Wayne Andersen ruled the sweeps unconstitutional, Clinton said he instructed Cisneros and Reno to develop a legal policy because "every law-abiding American, rich or poor, has the right to raise children without the fear of criminals terrorizing where they live." The first step, Clinton said, was Cisneros' visit to Chicago on Friday to release $29 million in emergency funds for enforcement and crime prevention in public housing. Authorities will crack down aggressively on gang members, drugs, weapons and itinerants in the buildings through steps that Reno and Cisneros said in a letter to the president "are constitutionally valid, at least in the extraordinary circumstances" present in the CHA. Other steps call for securing building entrances and lobbies so only tenants and guests can enter-through metal detectors-and frequent searches of common areas and vacant apartments. "This is particularly targeted to Chicago because of the emergency circumstances of the moment, the level of violence and gang war that is at its highest intensity," Cisneros told reporters Saturday, adding that other cities may adopt aspects of the plan. Noting the design of the Robert Taylor Homes-a series of 28 high-rises along South State Street-Cisneros said: "Public housing in the worst configuration has failed. . . . Much of it ought to be replaced." He is scheduled to unveil legislation Wednesday that could allow the CHA to finance up to $2 billion in bonds to transform its developments into less-dense neighborhoods of mixed-income families. In his ruling, Andersen said that police could not conduct warrantless searches of apartments unless police believe there is probable cause. The administration's policy recommends that officials expedite procedures to obtain warrants. Police can be equally aggressive in finding reasonable suspicion that a person is engaged in criminal activity and can be questioned and frisked, it suggests. Officials noted that the policy won the approval of Reno as well as Cisneros and was written on Justice Department stationery to give it added legal weight. They expect civil libertarians to challenge requirements for residents to pass through metal detectors, to sign leases granting the right to searches and for frisking suspicious people in and around housing developments, but administration officials believe the steps would be legal. Harvey Grossman, legal director for the Illinois branch of the American Civil Liberties Union, has served public notice that the ACLU will monitor the frisks closely. He also said that residents must be free to revoke the consents for searching their apartments and that their leases cannot hinge on it. William Bryson, a senior Justice Department lawyer, said the Fourth Amendment guarantee against illegal searches is a balancing act of need versus intrusion and that the need "to get control from the gangs . . . is extremely high." Cisneros said, "Conditions in public housing in Chicago, as well as other places right now, are so severe that any abstract analysis of people's rights of the type the ACLU might do is swamped in real life (when) people's rights (to live safely are) being denied." To demonstrate tenant support and defend against constitutional challenges, the policy suggests that tenant associations approve resolutions endorsing leases with search clauses. Bryson said that apartment leases traditionally give landlords the right to enter apartments for maintenance and in emergencies. "This is a form of emergency," he said. Meanwhile, U.S. Rep. Richard Durbin unveiled legislation Friday that would create safe zones in public housing projects. Durbin, a Springfield Democrat, said the measure would punish those who illegally possess or fire guns in public housing projects. Violators would get up to five years in prison and pay up to $5,000 in fines. "It is time for the federal government to lend a helping hand to public housing authorities which are struggling with violent crime," Durbin said. "This bill sends a clear message: If you get caught with an illegal firearm on public housing property, you will do time." GRAPHIC: GRAPHIC; GRAPHIC: New enforcement options.; The U.S. attorney general has presented to President Clinton a list of law enforcement measures that would be effective and constitutionally valid in dealing with severe problems of violent crime in urban public housing developments.; Source: U.S. attorney general.; Chicago Tribune/David Jahntz.; See microfilm for complete graphic. THE WHITE HOUSE Office of the Press Secretary ____________________________________________________________________ For Immediate Release April 11, 1994 REMARKS BY THE PRESIDENT IN TELEPHONE CALL TO A TOWN MEETING WITH SECRETARY CISNEROS The Oval Office 10:27 A.M. EDT SECRETARY CISNEROS: Mr. President, this is Henry Cisneros in Chicago. THE PRESIDENT: Hello, Henry, how are you? SECRETARY CISNEROS: Good, sir. I'm here with Senator Carol Moseley-Braun and Congressman Bobby Rush and Vince Lane of the Housing Authority, who's a good friend of yours, and about 200 folks at Progressive Community Church. And we are gathered together to talk about how to deal with the violence that's plagued the Chicago Housing Authority, Robert Taylor, Stateway and other developments over the last couple of days. We're sitting at a table with about 20 guns that were picked up last night in police actions; a verY violent weekend that resulted in about 15 shootings and five deaths -- one 16-year old was killed last night at Washington Park Homes, here in the area. We're looking at about 20 or so rifles, pistols, automatic weapons that were picked up in police action last night. So this is a very serious circumstance, and the group is very appreciative for your call, sir. THE PRESIDENT: Well, I'm very concerned that all the efforts that have been made there over the last several years -- and I'm glad Senator Moseley-Braun's there; I'm glad Bobby Rush is there -- I know you're in his district. And I know Vince Lane remembers the trip that we took into Robert Taylor Homes back in 1991, before I even started running for President. And I'm so worried that all the progress that's been made will be undermined by the court decision. I wonder if some of this violence has not been almost aggravated by the decision. And I'm hoping that you'll be able to find a constitutional solution to this working with the Attorney General. I know that this bike team effort last night did net a significant amount of guns and other things; and I'm encouraged by what you say. I want to encourage all the citizens who are there that we're going to do everything we can to support them and enable them to have control over their lives and not allow criminals to find shelter in the very public housing communities that they're terrorizing. I think it's very important. I just want to say -- you tell me what you think we have to do, and I'll do it. I've seen what can be done there when people can take control of their own destinies. And I think we owe it to them to do everything we can to give them their homes back. SECRETARY CISNEROS: Mr. President, we're looking at a strategy that is essentially four elements. And I'll prepare a report for you with the Attorney General and have something on your desk, hopefully by tomorrow or the next day. But obviously the first piece is to focus on the sweeps and the legality of what can be done to get the sweeps constitutional. Secondly, to focus on other security measures, other measures we can take, such as Operation Safe Home and other things we can do. Thirdly, to focus on such things as recreational programs this summer, recreational activity, midnight basketball, ballparks, anti-gang things, youth mentorship -- critically important, and the community recognizes that so. And then finally to focus on the long-term vision remake of public housing in Chicago. And we've got some ideas about that. And I'll get it all to you in writing. But I just wanted to give you kind of the strategy. I'm going to ask Senator Moseley-Braun to say a word, if I may, Mr. President. SENATOR MOSELEY-BRAUN: Good morning, Mr. President. THE PRESIDENT: Good morning, Senator. SENATOR MOSELEY-BRAUN: Mr. President, I am first delighted that you've called this morning. I know the community appreciates your concern and your attention to this critical issue. And of course, the Secretary coming out and staying last night was just unprecedented. And we are just very grateful for the commitment and the concern that's being expressed by your administration. I mentioned to the Secretary that the real bottom line in all of this is getting some money to create some jobs and to put in some security here at DHA. I mean, that's the bottom line. We can -- we've done sweeps before. They work for a while and then you have to go back to the problem. And the problem here, I think, Mr. President, is only going to be solved if we can put some investment in behalf of securing the buildings, providing security forces and giving people some jobs and some opportunity and some hope back. That really is bottom line here, and I think we're up to do it. And I think we can do it without breaking the bank. And I would very much appreciate -- Ivan's going to work with the Secretary and with Vince Lane and with the delegation. And your support, sir, will be absolutely critical in making sure that we can free up some money to do this. THE PRESIDENT: Thank you. You know, there's some money in the -- some significant money, especially in the House version of the crime bill that would provide for some jobs for young people in high crime areas. SENATOR MOSELEY-BRAUN: Right. THE PRESIDENT: And that's one of the things that we tried to do in rewriting it over on the House side, was to get some money in there so that we could determine the impact on the crime rate of providing jobs for people. I think -- of course, I know you agree with me, what we're going to find is if we can go into some of these neighborhoods and put people to work, the crime rate will go way down. SENATOR MOSELEY-BRAUN: I think that's right. That's right. Well, as you know, I'm going to support that legislation. And, again, if we can come up with some other initiatives -- Mr. Lane was talking about some things this morning. I want to work very closely with you, sir, and with this administration and the Secretary in behalf of putting together the money and putting together the initiatives we need to begin to turn around a history of neglect here. THE PRESIDENT: Thank you. SENATOR MOSELEY-BRAUN: Thank you again, sir. THE PRESIDENT: Thank you so much. REPRESENTATIVE RUSH: Mr. President? THE PRESIDENT: Yes. REPRESENTATIVE RUSH: Bobby Rush, how are you doing? THE PRESIDENT: Hi, Bobby, nice to hear your voice, Congressman. REPRESENTATIVE RUSH: Yes. Mr. President, I certainly appreciate your calling to the public housing community of the city of Chicago this morning. It's the first time that any Chief Executive Officer of this nation has taken a part of their day to discuss vital issues that all the residents here are concerned about and have been concerned about over the years. There are a lot of resources that I think that we can bring to bear on this. You and I have talked about this, particularly during the campaign. There are a lot of resources, I think, will be brought to bear if, in fact, we have the commitment and the vision to do that. I think gathered around this table, and in this room, we have really an advanced team of people who can come up with the solutions. And we certainly, in the Congress, can try to help assist you in terms of helping to find those resources and use creative efforts and creative endeavors to try to bring some resources into public housing; because the people who live here, they're the true victims. They didn't create public housing; they didn't locate it where it's located. Circumstances have forced them to live in these conditions, but they should not be exiled to living in public housing camps in the way they're living in them right now. We have to make these developments livable. Mr. President, I have a community leader here who's going to ask for 30 seconds to discuss -- to say something to you for about 30 seconds, if in fact that would be appropriate. THE PRESIDENT: Sure. MR. SISTRUNK(?): Mr. President, Mr. Clinton ? THE PRESIDENT: Yes. MR. SISTRUNK(?): First of all, I want to say my name is -- Sistrunk(?). And I want to encourage you to continue to support Mr. Lane and the Congressman and the Senator and Mr. Cisneros. Mr. President, last week, a couple of days ago, I spent a day in the hospital with a Terrence Graham, who was shot in the developments. I've lost kin people in the developments. Mr. President, I want to say sincerely to you, if you would in your next year or so, or whenever you're available, to come and witness the terror, the hurt and the pain, because it's serious, and it hurts, Mr. President. And we need you here in Chicago, but more important we need you to continue to support Mr. Lane and community activists and people who are concerned about death and dying and the residents. And I encourage you to take a stand, Mr. President. Thank you. (Applause.) THE PRESIDENT: Thank you very much. Thank you for what you said. SECRETARY CISNEROS: Mr. President, thank you very much. THE PRESIDENT: I want to thank the gentleman for his remarks. As I said, I once came to Chicago and visited the projects with Vince Lane shortly before I declared for President. And I would like to come again. And I do care a lot about what's going on there. And I'm encouraged by this meeting. And I want to thank Secretary Cisneros for so promptly responding to my request and going over there and spending the night and getting in closer touch with the situation. I feel better about it. And I hope we can do some things to help. I believe we can. SECRETARY CISNEROS: Mr. President, thank you for calling. I'm going to sign off with Vince Lane saying a couple of words to you, and we'll close out. We appreciate your time very much. We know there's things swirling in the world and you've got a busy schedule, so we deeply appreciate your call. THE PRESIDENT: Thanks. MR. LANE: Mr. President? THE PRESIDENT: Yes. Hi, Vince. MR. LANE: How are you? THE PRESIDENT: Great. MR. LANE: Mr. President, I want to say that this is a historic day in Chicago. We have a symbol here -- are people from all perspectives of this community. As you know, some of the things that we've had to do in order to try to protect life have been controversial; but in the end what I know, as you heard from Mr. Sistrunk(?) and from the Senator and the Congressman -- there we all have the same bottom line -- we've got to make this a safe place for poor black children in this city and in this country so that they can have the same opportunities as everyone else. And I know that with your leadership, under your leadership, and Secretary Cisneros and the leadership that you will bring and the champion of the efforts to redress the problems in Chicago with the Congress will yield us real longlasting permanent change in this country. And so I just want to thank you for exercising the leadership that you have undertaken here with sending Secretary Cisneros and involving Janet Reno with addressing the problems here in public housing in Chicago. THE PRESIDENT: Well, thank you Vince, and thanks for blazing away for us and making people believe that we could actually do something to improve life in public housing. You showed me that it could be done years ago, and I'm convinced that maybe we can use this court decision as a spur to even do a better job, a more comprehensive job. We're going to do everything we possibly can. MR. LANE: God bless you. THE PRESIDENT: Thanks -- it's nice to hear your voice. Goodbye, ladies and gentlemen. Thank you. (Applause.) END10:37 A.M. ED THE WHITE HOUSE Office of the Press Secretary _____________________________________________________________________ For Immediate Release April 11, 1994 REMARKS BY THE PRESIDENT TO LAW ENFORCEMENT OFFICERS The Justice Department Washington, DC 12:36 P.M. EDT THE PRESIDENT: Thank you very much, Officer Williams. If you just keep doing your work, and I'll be glad to carry your notebook anytime. (Laughter.) There are a lot of days when you do more than we do up here anyway. (Laughter.) I want to thank you, and thank you, Earline Williams, for your commitment and your remarkable statement and the work you and your husband are doing. Thank you, Eddie, for reminding us that we have an obligation to fight for your future. Thanks for bringing your friends, and thank you, officers for giving him something to look up to and believe in. (Applause.) I want to welcome the new officers from Albany, Georgia, and thank them for their commitment to law enforcement and thank all the other people in law enforcement who are here at the local and state and federal level. In the last congressional recess, like the Attorney General, I got out around the country and listened to people; talked to them about a lot of issues. And I found that all over the country in every region, among people from all walks of life, all races and income groups and political parties, there is a deep concern about the tide of crime and violence in this country and about the underlying strains on our fabric as a common people that these have imposed. We have simply got to do everything we can to move forward in helping the American people to reduce crime; to say no to those things which they ought to say no to; and to give our young people some more things to say yes to. I came here today to emphasize how terribly important it is that the House of Representatives consider the crime bill immediately on its return. The Speaker has agreed to do that. I then want the Senate and the House to get together and resolve their differences and send me the crime bill as soon as possible. The American people have waited long enough. We don't need to waste their time with frivolous or political amendments and delay. We don't need to take months on a task that can be done in a couple of weeks. If the bill is on my desk in weeks, I will only take a minute to sign it. And then the American people will begin to have the tools they need to solve so many of their problems. This has been a good year for us in this country. Our deficit is going down, and our economy is going up. Twice as many private sector jobs have come into this economy in the last 14 months than in the previous four years. After seven years of gridlock, the Brady Bill became the Brady Law, and is already working to stop felons and fugitives from purchasing handguns. And I'm proud that it was passed with the help of America's law enforcement officers. But everything that we are trying to do to move this country forward and to bring this country together will be undermined unless we can give the American people a greater sense that they are secure in their homes, on their streets, and in their schools. The number of murders has tripled since 1960, so has the number of crimes per uniformed police officer. Death by gunfire will soon surpass death by car accidents. Almost a third of all of our families have had someone victimized by crime. Today, one in 20 American children carry a weapon to school, and over 150,000 stay home every day because they're afraid of what might happen to them in school. We know the crime bill cannot solve all these problems. We know many of them will have to be solved by those people who are here today in uniform and people like them, and the friends and neighbors they have, like Mrs. Williams. We know that. We know that unless there are young people like Eddie and his friends who are willing to work and be role models themselves and make something of their own lives, that everything we do here in Washington will be limited. But we know, too, that we have to take the lead. We have to take the initiative. And that we can give people like these people the tools they need to seize control of their lives and make their communities safer and better places to learn, to work and to grow. The crime bill provides funding for another 100,000 police officers over five years for community policing because it works. It will make a difference. You already heard what Officer Williams said about 12 officers in Albany, Georgia. The Mayor of Houston put 655 more police officers on the beat. In 15 months, crime dropped 22 percent, murders went down 27 percent. This can be done everywhere. This bill, with community policing will help the police officers of our country not only to catch more criminals and put them behind bars, but to reduce crime and to connect with more young people before it's too late. I was very moved by what Eddie said about his attitude about the police, because of the work of these two fine police officers. We know that crime can be reduced and that lives can be enhanced. So as the Attorney General said, policing is a big part of this crime bill. If Congress passes the bill soon to give the American people more police officers, I'll make this commitment to you: I'll cut through the bureaucracy and the red tape in Washington so that within a year 20,000 of these new officers will actually be hired and trained and working to make our streets safer. If they'll send me the bill, we'll cut the red tape. No more politics in Congress; no more red tape in the bureaucracy. Let's give the police to the American people, and let's do it this year. (Applause.) The second thing this bill is about is punishment. And I want to emphasize, if I might, three things. There's been a great deal of debate, and much honest disagreement about whether we ought to have some sort of three-strikes-and-you're-out bill. I would like to make two points about that, as someone who started my public career as a state attorney general almost two decades ago now. First of all, an overwhelming percentage of the really serious violent crimes are committed by a relatively few people. Even a small percentage of the criminals in our country commit an overwhelming percentage of the really serious violent crimes. Secondly, this law is designed to be directed, if it's properly drawn, against a narrow class of people -- those who do not commit crimes for which it's already one strike and you're out. Keep in mind, many of our crimes today can get you a life sentence or a very long sentence just by doing it one time. But there are people that are clearly and demonstrably highly likely to take life or to commit serious, horrible crimes. We know them by their profiles -- who do things which clearly indicate this, and still they can wind up being paroled after relatively modest sentences. This bill is designed, if properly drawn -- and the Attorney General has done a fine job of working on the bill that is coming through the House -- to be directed against that narrow class of people. I do think those folks, you can say, if you do this three times, we do not think you should be paroled. And I believe it will enable us, for those who think this is too harsh, to create more enlightened attitudes about other people who may be put in prison for too long a period of time, or who may need alternative rehabilitation strategies. But these police officers are out there putting their lives on the line, oftentimes in the face of people who are back on the street that they know are highly likely to do something that is life-threatening. So respectfully, I dispute those who believe that we can't have a three-strikes-and-you're-out law that is good, that is properly drawn and that makes a difference. We shouldn't let a small percentage of even the criminal population terrorize the country if we can find a way to stop it. And this is our best effort. The second point I want to make is that this bill does some other things about punishment, too. This bill encourages states and localities to find alternative punishments for first-time nonviolent offenders, for young people -- boot camps or other kinds of community-based programs which may reconnect people to their communities before it is too late, and which will give them a chance not only to be punished but to learn something while they're doing their respective sentences. So this is a smart punishment bill. The third thing this bill is about is prevention. We know these programs work, too, especially for young people. And I want to say a special word of thanks here to the Attorney General. When I appointed her, I wanted someone who had actual experience on the front lines fighting crime and who understood that you have to be both tough and smart. And her relentless, constant, compassionate but tough-minded advocacy for a sensible prevention strategy is critical to the fact that we now have about a billion dollars in this plan for jobs for young people in high crime neighborhoods and recreation programs and summer programs and opportunities for young people to bond with caring, concerned adults who care about their future. I thank her for that. And that's a very important part of this bill. It will make a huge difference to young people of America. (Applause.) A big part of that is making the schools safe and drug- free and free of violence again. If our children can't be safe in school and going to and from school, they're going to have a very hard time. After all, a lot of the young people most at risk of being victims of crime as well as at risk of becoming criminals at a young age, live in communities very different from those that most of us grew up in -- communities where the family structure has been weakened; communities where other organizations are weaker than they once were; and communities in which there is almost no work for people to do. When you take work and community and family out of a neighborhood, you create an awful vacuum in which only bad things -- only bad things -- can occur unless someone moves in to fill the vacuum. Our schools are trying. But we are asking them to do in many of our communities today, we are asking them to do things that no one ever thought the schools could do alone. And we have got to continue to support them through these safe school initiatives and the other prevention plans. So that's what we're trying to do in this crime bill --more police, more punishment, more prevention. In this time of budgetary constraints, the very idea that we're about to pass a program that will involve over $20 billion in new money is an astonishing thing. It's a lot more money for state and local initiatives, but we have to do it. And I am proud of the fact that it is going to be paid for, not with a tax increase, but with the phase-down of the federal government. We are reducing over a five-year period the size of the federal bureaucracy by about 250,000 people. And all the savings are going to go on into a trust fund to pay for this crime bill, so that at the end of five years we will have a federal government that it is small as it was when President Kennedy was in office; and the money saved from that downsizing will be giving our communities a chance and the money saved from that downsizing will be giving our communities a chance to give our kids a future and our people a chance to be safe on the streets. I think that's a pretty good switch, and I appreciate the initiative in doing it. (Applause.) Let me say again in closing, there is not a moment to lose. People are trying everywhere to do something about this, and everywhere they are being frustrated. The case of the Chicago Housing Authority has been in the news because just a few days ago, a federal district court declared that the Housing Authority's own policy of sweeping their units for guns, for ineligible people living there and for drugs, was unconstitutional. As soon as I heard about that, I asked the Attorney General and the Secretary of Housing and Urban Development, Henry Cisneros, to develop another policy that is constitutional and effective; because I have been to the Chicago housing projects. And I have been in the places where the sweeps occurred, and where the housing units were cleaned up, and where the people who were living in the housing units were hired to work with the police to ride up in the elevator and walk down the stairs and keep the places clean. And I saw children pouring out of housing units -- pouring out -- to run up to the head of the Chicago Housing Authority, Vince Lane, as if he were their saviour because he simply gave them a safe place to live. So does this administration want to follow the Constitution of the United States? You bet we do. But I can't believe that we can't find a way to have a constitutional search of places that we know are full of victims of crime because they harbor criminals. We are going to find a way to solve this problem. Thirteen people died in Chicago violently last weekend -- three of them in the Robert Taylor Homes Project. Last night, Secretary Cisneros spent the night in that project, and he called me today from there and we had a conversation about this. He and the Attorney General are working on it. But I say this just to make this point: Those folks living out there in those housing projects, most of them are not criminals, most of them are good people. They are obey the law; they're doing the best they can to raise their children. They deserve -- they deserve our best and our quickest efforts. So I say to you again in closing -- I thank you for coming here, but we know we're all preaching to the saved today. Tomorrow when the Congress comes back, there are many other things that will claim their attention. I will ask them to think about many other things. You must say, "Pass the crime bill now." Thank you very much. (Applause.) END12:53 P.M. EDT Copyright 1992 Maclean Hunter Limited Maclean's November 16, 1992 SECTION: COVER; Pg. 48 HEADLINE: INNER-CITY PAIN; CHICAGO IS A TEST FOR CLINTON'S REFORMS BYLINE: CHRIS WOOD in Chicago The civic officials who manage Chicago's Cabrini-Green public housing project call the place "a living nightmare." Shootings, burglaries and assaults are daily occurrences in the besieged North Side neighborhood of beige brick townhouses and redbrick highrises. Most cabdrivers refuse to answer calls from addresses their. Other Chicagoans routinely detour for blocks rather than drive through the area. Those who have no choice deal with the fear as best they can. Tenants like 28-year-old Jacqueline Russell, a mother of five, confront the insolence and threats of murderous drug gangs daily, braving dimly lit and grimy hallways covered with graffiti in order to reach cramped apartments. "At night," Russell told Maclean's, "we just have to walk on fate." The low point came early on the morning of Oct. 13: a sniper shot and killed seven-year-old Dantrell Davis as he walked with his mother to the neighborhood school. It was a grim reminder of the magnitude of the problem facing president-elect Bill Clinton as he prepares to grapple with the problems of America's crumbling inner cities. Weapons: The incident also illustrated some of the methods that Clinton may use in trying to improve conditions in the cities. Two weeks after the Chicago shooting, scores of representatives from local, state and federal agencies descended on the Cabrini-Green project's 86 buildings. With FBI and U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration officers looking on, Chicago Housing Authority staff, responding to Davis's death, drastically stepped up the pace of a year-old program of security sweeps. Housing Authority officials checked apartments in four Cabrini-Green apartment towers for unauthorized tenants, drugs and guns, evicting any offenders. Maintenance crews installed high-security entrances equipped with metal detectors and turnstiles to keep the weapons out of the buildings. "I'm all for it," said Russell's husband, Benjamin, a 31-year-old window washer. "We need to clean this up." The need is desperate and shockingly widespread in America's cities. Despite the sobering April riots in Los Angeles that left 58 people dead, Republican administration officials have done little to stop the decline of innercities. The result is evident in most of the country's large centres: grim streetscapes of boarded-up, burned-out or abandoned businesses; entire blocks reduced to rubble, some left abandoned so long that trees sprout from mounds of broken brick and concrete; whole neighborhoods, like Cabrini-Green, where outsiders fear to tread. In a sweeping and unusually detailed campaign statement of policy goals last summer, Clinton and his running mate, Senator Al Gore, promised to attack the blight in America's cities with everything from a reinforced police presence and welfare reform to a new network of neighborhood development banks. Many of their proposals drew on attempts already underway to address the particularly savage problems in Chicago. With the election now over, the third-largest U.S. city becomes a pivotal test case for Clinton's readiness to match campaign rhetoric with action. Nowhere, certainly, are the ills of urban America more depressingly visible than in the Windy City. Single foster-mother Saundra Bell knows well why other Chicago residents avoid her area. Bell shares a one-bedroom apartment on the ninth floor of a Cabrini-Green highrise with her six-month-old nephew. She adopted him after his mother, a drug addict, became unable to care for him. She said that she, too, is afraid of "the gang-bangers downstairs with the drugs and the shooting." Until the recent round of Housing Authority sweeps, she said, violence was nearly constant in the building. Said Bell: "They fight over turf. Every night after ten o'clock till two or three in the morning -- that's when they get finished." Promises: After the shock that followed Dantrell Davis's mid-October murder, Chicago Mayor Richard Daley Jr. promised a counterattack on the epidemic of violence at the city's 19 public-housing projects, home to almost 90,000 people. In addition to the sweeps, planned measures include sealing off four of the most dilapidated highrises at Cabrini-Green. And there were promises to provide better recreation facilities for project residents. Tenants like Bell welcomed the increased security promised by the sweeps, but many remained skeptical of the mayor's commitment to long-term improvement in the projects. Said Bell: "I'm afraid after this election's over, they're going to forget about us again." Clinton and Gore may indeed have raised expectations that they will find difficult to fulfil. In a book co-written by the two Democrats, they proposed to copy the Chicago Housing Authority's Operation Clean Sweep security initiative as part of a "new partnership to rebuild America's cities." With the stated goal of "Putting People First," as the book's title boasts, the Democrats proposed hiring 100,000 additional police officers and reforming the welfare system. As well, they called for the creation of national networks of neighborhood banks dedicated to local economic development and of so-called boot camps designed to "instill discipline, boost self-esteem and teach respect for law" among non-violent young offenders. Several of those proposals have their roots in initiatives already at work in Chicago and surrounding Cook County. The county sheriff's office, for one, has enlisted Marine Corps instructors to train the staff for a boot camp that it plans to open within 18 months to accommodate up to 1,200 first offenders at a time. Activism: The proposal to establish neighborhood development banks in economically strapped communities has even deeper roots in Chicago. The prototype for the idea, Clinton said during the campaign, is an unconventional institution housed in an undistinguished three-storey building 15 km south of Cabrini-Green. For almost 19 years, the South Shore Bank has operated profitably on a hybrid philosophy of social activism and fiduciary caution. It accepts deposits like any other commercial bank, but lends money to people that most other banks would refuse as bad credit risks. The bank's unusual practices reflect goals that 10 investors, several of them churches and private philanthropies, set for it when they took over the faltering institution in 1973. In contrast to what executive vice-president Mary Houghton described as "profit- maximizing banks, which gravitate to the largest possible deal in the highest-profit environment," the South Shore Bank's business mandate specifies that its goals include the economic development of the 80,000 people who live in theneighborhood it serves. Most of the bank's lending -- it had $ 160 million in loans outstanding at the end of last year -- has been to borrowers in the largely African-American community who, according to the U.S. Federal Reserve Board, are twice as likely as white applicants to be turned down for mortgages by more traditional banks. The bank's neighborhood has benefited visibly. In striking contrast to the rubble- strewn vacant lots of some other poor Chicago neighborhoods, the treed streets surrounding the South Shore Bank are line with well-kept three- and four-storey brick apartments, many of them refurbished with fund borrowed from the bank. Just down the street, a tidy shopping mall, also built with bank investment, anchors the area's retail businesses. Said Peter Payne, a former insurance company manager, who sought help from the bank to buy and rehabilitate several area apartment buildings: "Other banks were looking for reasons not to do something. At South Shore, they were looking for reasons to do something." Clinton's interest in the bank's unusual philosophy dates back eight years when Jan Piercy, a former college roommate of his wife, Hillary, paid a Thanksgiving visit to the Arkansas governor's mansion. Piercy, who hadworked on development problems in Banngladesh and Thailand, was weighing a job offerfrom the South Shore Bank. Coincidentally, the bank had developed a plan to try to replicate its Chicago success in rural Arkansas. Piercy helped enlist the Clinton's aid, and in 1988 a holding company modelled on the South Shore Bank acquired the Elk Horn Bank of Arkadelphia, a small town about 100 km southwest of Little Rock. Hillary Clinton became a director. Difficulties: The Elk Horn Bank's uneven record, however, underscores the difficulties that Clinton's administration faces as it seeks to solve America's urban problems. Although the bank has prospered, president George Surgeon acknowledges that some of its attempts to match the South Shore Bank's successes "just didn't translate well." In particular, the new bank has failed to find many qualified takers for the "micro-loans," as Surgeon describes them, that it wants to make to budding, small- scale rural entrepreneurs. Other difficulties await the Democrats should they attempt to enact their ambitious program for urban revival. The most obvious is money: many of their promises are certain to be costly. Complicating the political equation for Clinton is the fact thatmuch of the money that must be spent to rescue the largely black inner cities must be raised from mostly white suburban taxpayers. Many analysts say that the white majority is not particularly willing to pay for programs directed mainly at members of the minority race. Said Chicago-based oral historian and author, Studs Terkel, who published a book earlier this year examining Americans' attitudesto race: "The white people haven't a clue, not a clue, as to how black people feel." At the same time, little of whatClinton has proposed is likely to show results in time to benefit his administration when it seeks a second term in 1996. Said Houghton of her bank's successful efforts in south Chicago: "These are all long-term programs. There arenot four-year or even eight-year paybacks." That may be one reason that Clinton was silent on most of his urban-policy proposals when, a week before the election, he outlined his priorities for a first term. Of the policies set out in "Putting People First" for aiding America's cities, only the law-and-order proposal to establish boot camps for juvenile offenders found a place on Clinton's list of urgent policies. To skeptics, those concerns point to continuing neglect for America's most troubled communities. GRAPHIC: Picture 1, Police searching youths for weapons at Cabrini-Green: an epidemic of violence, HESTOFT/SABA; Picture 2, Evictions at Cabrini-Green: bank loans and boot camps, HORAN/PICTURE GROUP Copyright 1988 The New York Times Company The New York Times December 17, 1988, Saturday, Late City Final Edition SECTION: Section 1; Page 8, Column 1; National Desk HEADLINE: Chicago's Housing Raids Challenged BYLINE: By WILLIAM E. SCHMIDT, Special to the New York Times DATELINE: CHICAGO, Dec. 16 A series of surprise raids to sweep gangs and other criminal elements from the city's troubled public housing projects has resulted in widespread violations of the civil rights of tenants and their guests, the American Civil Liberties Union charged today. In a lawsuit filed in Federal District Court on behalf of the city's 150,000 public housing tenants, the civil liberties group said the Chicago Police Department and the Chicago Housing Authority had searched tenants' apartments and personal belongings without warrants and detained people without cause in surprise inspections this fall at three public housing complexes. The lawsuit also charged that the housing authority had imposed unreasonable restrictions on visitors, including a prohibition that bars overnight visits even by grandchildren and other relatives of tenants. This afternoon representatives of the civil liberties group met with city housing officials to discuss their concerns. Housing officials later announced that an agreement had been reached to relax restrictions on visitors. However, both sides could not resolve the question of the surprise inspections, but said they would continue talks next week. Security or Civil Rights Violation? Katie Kelly, a spokeswoman for the Chicago Housing Authority, said the authority considered the suprise sweeps essential to restoring security and safety to the city's public housing buildings. The sweeps are part of an aggressive new security policy adopted by Vincent Lane, the new executive director of the Chicago Housing Authority. Since taking over in June, he has publicly vowed to rid the nation's second largest public housing system of a plague of drug dealers and gangs, who in recent years have been blamed for dozens of murders, rapes and shootings. As a result of the raids, 31 people have been arrested on various charges, including criminal trespass or possession of drugs, and scores more have been barred from re- entering apartments where they had lived illegally. In addition, several weapons and small quantities of drugs and drug paraphernalia have been seized. Jay Miller, the executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Illinois, said today the lawsuit was based on the specific complaints of five people, including tenants as well as visitors, who said they now had trouble getting into the buildings to see relatives. Mr. Miller said the organization endorsed efforts by the Chicago Housing Authority to make public housing in the city safe and secure. ''But they have gone too far,'' Mr. Miller said. He said he did not question the right of the housing authority to evict squatters or to conduct reasonable inspections. Objections to Police Searches But the lawsuit contends that the housing authority does not have the right to bring the police into tenants' apartments without a warrant to search through drawers, closets or personal belongings under the guise of a housing inspection. Morever, the civil liberties group said many tenants also objected to rigid new regulations that, among other things, prohibit anyone who is not named on the apartment lease from remaining inside the apartment overnight. New security grates have been built around the buildings, and housing guards demand the identity of any person visiting the building. All tenants must produce identification cards to enter the buildings. Since the housing authority launched its first raid in September on a high-rise public housing building on the West Side, the tactic has been the object of both widespread praise and condemnation. The Chicago Defender, a newspaper that circulates widely in the city's black community, published a front-page article last week reporting that many public housing tenants praised the security sweeps as long overdue. Crime, drugs and gang problems have been endemic in 15 public housing projects that Mr. Lane has targeted for surprise inspections. For example, residents of a building in Cabrini Green, a complex on the city's Near North side that was raided earlier this month, reported 31 incidents of sniper fire over a six-week period beginning Oct. 1. Over that same period, police said, there were two murders and six rapes. It is a measure of the problems in some public housing units that a 9-year-old boy died here earlier this week when Fire Department paramedics refused to enter a South Side project out of fear for their safety. The youth's mother had summoned the Fire Department after her son suffered an asthma attack. The paramedics said their ambulance was being pelted with stones. However, residents of the project disputed the story, and the youth's mother has since filed a $60 million lawsuit against the Fire Department as a result of the incident. The strategy has also had some other, unintended effects. After housing officials earlier this fall evicted several men who were living with women to whom they were not married, eight of the couples later agreed to be married in a joint civil service. Copyright 1992 Chicago Tribune Company Chicago Tribune November 19, 1992, Thursday, NORTH SPORTS FINAL EDITION SECTION: CHICAGOLAND; Pg. 2; ZONE: C HEADLINE: ACLU charges CHA violates tenant rights BYLINE: By Matt O'Connor. Police have violated a 3-year-old court agreement by indiscriminately searching tenants and visitors at the Cabrini-Green public housing complex in the outcry over a child's sniper slaying, a lawyer for the American Civil Liberties Union charged Wednesday. The Chicago Housing Authority went to federal court three weeks ago to win approval for beefed-up security measures during "sweeps," but Harvey Grossman, legal director of the ACLU of Illinois, alleged some of the measures have been imposed at Cabrini-Green before any court action. Both Chicago and CHA police have been conducting pat-down searches of tenants and visitors, particularly young black males, without a legal and reasonable suspicion of wrongdoing, Grossman alleged. "Beyond the fact they were at Cabrini-Green, there was nothing distinguishing about them," Grossman said of those searched by police. Grossman also charged that visitors are required to show photo identification, also in violation of a 1989 consent decree signed by the CHA. In the public outcry over the Oct. 13 sniper slaying of 7-year-old Dantrell Davis as he walked to school from his Cabrini-Green home, the CHA is seeking to modify the decree in order to install metal detectors and to allow authorities to search tenants and their apartments, as well as visitors, for guns and drugs. Such measures would "gut" the consent decree and violate tenants' constitutional rights, Grossman told U.S. District Judge Wayne Andersen. But attorney James J. Casey, representing the CHA, insisted that, with the decree in place, the CHA has been unable "to stem the flow of guns and drugs" into its buildings. "We're not trying to trample on people's rights," Casey said later. "There's a right to live and live in a peaceful existence." Outside court, Grossman said the beefed-up security measures not only would "obliterate" public housing tenants' constitutional rights but also "would not be effective." "The problems are much more serious and more complex," Grossman said. "Conditions in public housing are the result of three decades of neglect. There are no short-term solutions. We need a lot of resources pumped in." The extent of crime in certain Chicago neighborhoods parallels the problem in CHA developments, yet no one is suggesting police should be given authority to indiscriminate searches of private homes, Grossman said. Copyright 1992 Globe Newspaper Company The Boston Globe October 25, 1992, Sunday, City Edition SECTION: NATIONAL/FOREIGN; Pg. 1 HEADLINE: A 'prison' called Cabrini; Chicago project ignored - until shots kill again BYLINE: By Patricia Smith, Globe Staff DATELINE: CHICAGO It is 2:30 p.m., the end of the day at Jenner Elementary School, and Gerald Williams, 7, bolts away from the building clutching the hand of his little sister Toya, 5. Urging her to "Run, Toya, run!," Gerald pulls his sister across the cluttered expanse of blacktop separating the school from the Cabrini-Green highrise where they live. Toya's bookbag bangs against her legs, she whimpers and stumbles, but Gerald will not stop running. By the time they have reached home, both are gasping for breath. "My momma told us to run," Gerald explains. "Ever since that little boy got killed, right over there, momma told me and Toya run home fast as we could. And if we hear shooting, we s'posed to drop to the ground and roll around so they can't hit us." Wide- eyed Toya nods in agreement, never letting go of her brother's hand. On Tuesday, October 13, 7-year-old Dantrell Davis was shot and killed by a sniper as his mother walked him to school. Anthony Garrett, 33, confessed that he had balanced his AR-15 automatic rifle on the edge of a 10th story window and fired at a group of teen-agers "until I saw someone fall." When he learned that his victim was a first-grader and not a rival gang member, his conscience drove him into custody. Immediately after Dantrell's death, Chicago began to scream. Again. Right on cue, Cabrini became a cause, a shame, a mistake that must be corrected. The sprawling 91- building complex, crouched like a crazy cousin on the edge of some of Chicago's glitziest real estate, is a blight easily ignored - until shots ring out and someone who should not have died does. The screams were heard on March 8, when 9-year-old Anthony Felton was shot in the chest, and on July 23 when Laquanda Evans, 15, was felled by a sniper. Just over 7,000 people reside officially in Cabrini-Green's 3,493 apartments. Officials estimate that another 10,000 may reside there illegally. It is the second largest public housing development in the world, behind Robert Taylor Homes on Chicago's south side. More than 91 percent of Cabrini's residents are unemployed; most are on public aid. In the urban prison called Cabrini, there have always been children like Gerald and Toya, racing across gang turf after school, looking over their shoulders with wide, frightened eyes. Elderly residents of "The Green" - some who remember the beginning, when lawns sparkled and people sat with their doors open - now scurry out early to the area's few high-priced convenience stores, then return to their shadowy apartments, where they sit in darkness, jumping at strange noises. Mothers watch as their young sons don gang colors and begin to swagger. Gunshots ricochet off the tired brick; families sleep on the floor instead of in their beds. Even a young woman carrying her child must worry about the tilt of the infant's hat, lest he be identified with some rival gang - a gang that doesn't stop to ask questions. On Friday, work crews descended on the complex with buzzsaws, buckets of white paint, fresh bricks and mortar. White crew members whistled as they worked, working hard to disguise their apprehension at being in no man's land. The city's latest antiviolence - or "anti-Cabrini," hissed one resident - plan calls for the installation of security booths, turnstiles and metal detectors in Cabrini's 33 highrises. Four of the more sparsely occupied buildings - havens for the gang and drug trade - will be shuttered completely, and 270 off-duty police officers will sweep the area for weapons. All residents in first-floor apartments will be moved to other public housing units, and the apartments will be sealed. Eventually, Chicago Housing Authority chairman Vince Lane has promised, "every single apartment in Cabrini-Green will be swept. There will be no place for crime to hide." But residents say that at this stage nothing will undo the damage. Since the first building went up in 1942, mismanagement and grand plans gone wrong have turned Cabrini into the country's ugliest example of a dream deferred. Now the very name "Cabrini" is synonymous with what many people fear most about urban America: rage and hopelessness spiraling out of control. Watching Friday's bustle of cosmetic activity with a practiced wariness, 51-year-old Rosie Johnson echoed the thoughts of many residents: "You can't put hell out with a garden hose." Cassandra Booth, who has lived in Cabrini since January, agrees. "I got to get out of here," she said, balancing a squirming 6-month-old on one hip. "I done seen enough to know that painting it white won't make it better." Cassandra, 19, and her two children, 2-year-old Erica and little Ernest, live on the 13th floor at 502 W. Oak, the building Anthony Garrett sprinkled with gunfire on the morning of Oct. 13. The elevator doesn't work, and the hall's lightbulbs have been smashed, so she must walk up a dark stairwell with her children. She goes out in the daytime. At night she does not. "If my baby runs out of milk or diapers or something, I just pray he's OK till the next day," she said. "I have nightmares about those stairs. Sometimes there are people up there, just sitting on the stairs, staring at you in the dark. And it just stinks so much. I close my eyes every night and just wish I could be somewhere else until the sun comes up. I hear shooting all the time. It's the Vice Lords over here, the Cobras over there." She points to the building across the street, where the 10th floor windows have been boarded up. "I promise my children that I'm going to get them out of here. That little boy could have been my baby." Ernest gurgles and pokes playfully at his mother's eye. On the other side of the complex, farther than the route Gerald ran with his sister, is the building at 365 Oak where silver-haired Edna Crenshaw lives. A walk with "Miz Crenshaw," is a chance to see the hope in Cabrini-Green. Everyone waves or smiles at her. The gang members tease her; children tug at her skirt. A bespectacled man ambles over on a cane, and when Crenshaw mentions not having seen him in awhile, he lowers his head sheepishly. "I been in the penitentiary for ten years, Miss Crenshaw," he says. "Couple of weeks ago, snipers shot me in the stomach." She touches his shoulder, shakes her head. Inside Edna Crenshaw's apartment, the evening has begun to cast shadows. Granddaughter Melissa, who lives with Crenshaw, screeches from room to room, laughing and playing with a friend from next door. There are clothes and newspapers covering the floor, commendations for volunteer work tacked on the wall. One plaque says, "To accomplish great things, we must not only act but also dream, not only plan but also believe." That is the way Edna Crenshaw lives her life. Her two children have grown up and left Cabrini. Her daughter went to college and earned a master's degree in sociology. With hell all around her, "Miz Crenshaw" refused to succumb to the heat. "I took my kids wherever they went," she said. "They were brought up in Sunday school and church. I didn't send them, I took them. And I'm doing the same thing now with granddaughter, my son's daughter. Too many of these folks let their kids loose too soon. "I never had any problems, in all the 36 years I been living here. About 3 months ago, somebody did shoot at my front door. The bullet stuck in the door, but I didn't hear anything because I was sleeping. The Lord didn't intend for me to hear anything. I've never had anything like a break-in. A stray hit my kitchen window one day, but that's pretty common around here. That's nothing to get all sweaty about." When Edna Crenshaw moved into Cabrini in 1956, things were different. "It was beautiful. It was mixed, there were white people and black people. You could sleep on your porch. You could sleep with the doors open. "The people who ran this place seemed to care more. They screened everybody who moved in. They did inspections in the apartments. They don't do any of that anymore. I hate to say it, but when the white people started disappearing, so did the services. Maybe to them we're not paying a lot of rent, but to us, with our incomes, it's a lot. Services are due, and we should get them. We're not all killers and drug dealers. We're human." When Cabrini's elderly citizens hurry out in the morning for their groceries, Edna Crenshaw is often not among them. She refuses to let fear dictate her comings and goings. "I always take the Lord with me, and I always say 'He made me, he will protect me.' I walk the streets on His grace. If I feel like I want to go out at 10 p.m. at night, I go. I don't go with fear. "Every time something happens out here, people all of a sudden remember that Cabrini-Green is dangerous. But it's been dangerous for a long, long time, and there's been people living here all along. People just losing their spirits in here every day." There have been six murders in the project so far this year. Kelvin Reynold says he has witnessed one of them. In baggy clothes and a bright-green skullcap, Kelvin struts through the desolation with a cool that belies his 13 years. He is not impressed with the workers hammering away at yet another security checkpoint. "Just wait six months. Then come back. Everything gon' be back to normal. Brothers be running it again." Kelvin leans on a rusty Monte Carlo automobile with a few of his friends, boys who are younger, yet somehow older, than he is. He stands up abruptly, smacks his forehead, spins around, and the group breaks into spasms of nervous laughter. It takes a moment to realize that Kelvin is describing the death of Dantrell Davis. GRAPHIC: PHOTO, Edna Crenshaw, a resident of Chicago's Cabrini-Green complex since 1956, sits with her granddaughter, Melissa, and a friend. GLOBE PHOTO / FRED JEWELL Copyright 1992 The Times Mirror Company Los Angeles Times November 1, 1992, Sunday, Bulldog Edition SECTION: Part A; Page 1; Column 1; Advance Desk HEADLINE: DUCK THE BULLET: HOW CHILDREN SURVIVE CHICAGO'S CABRINI-GREEN; POVERTY: GUNFIRE IS NOT THE ONLY DANGER IN THIS HIGH-RISE HOUSING PROJECT. KIDS MUST ALSO TRY TO DODGE DRUGS, GANGS AND DESPAIR. BYLINE: By SHARON COHEN, ASSOCIATED PRESS DATELINE: CHICAGO Al Carter believes there is a code of survival that all young people must learn at Cabrini-Green. He sums it up in three simple words: Duck the bullet. It means more than hitting the ground when guns start crackling and snipers start shooting. It means avoiding gangs, drugs and the other demons that destroy so many lives and cause so many deaths at the housing project. "It's the negative surroundings that might be able to grab a young person up, swallow him whole, spit him out and make him run wild until he's hit by a bullet," Carter says. "It's difficult to duck a bullet at Cabrini." Dantrell Davis didn't even have a chance. The 7-year-old was murdered Oct. 13 by a sniper aiming an AR-15 semi-automatic rifle with a scope from a 10th-floor window. The little boy was walking with his mother from their home to school -- a 100-foot, one-minute journey that proved too perilous, even with the police parked nearby. He was the third pupil from Jenner School to be murdered in seven months. It was Dantrell's death, though, that shocked the city, that grabbed the headlines, that spurred the mayor, police and public housing officials to say the killing must stop, this must never happen again, something must be done. But Carter, who was brought up in Cabrini and now runs an athletic foundation for kids there, wonders when -- and if -- it will end. "We continue to talk about the deaths, we rant and we rave, we get news coverage, yet the murders go on," he says. "It's heartbreaking." Carter has given eulogies at five funerals of Cabrini children since 1985. The first was Laketa Crosby, a bubbly 9-year-old killed in gang cross-fire while jumping rope double-dutch. The most recent was Anthony Felton, a budding 9-year-old boxer, shot in March, on the day he was supposed to collect a trophy. "You remember what they did," Carter says. "You can remember the laughter. When it happens, it just tears you in half." This time, Carter knew the accused, Anthony Garrett, 33, an Army veteran and expert marksman with a criminal record, and had hired him to umpire baseball games at Cabrini as part of a gang intervention program. "I still can't believe it," Carter says. "I was the guy who encouraged him to go to the Army to get off the streets." At 51, Carter is a mentor to some kids, a surrogate parent to others, giving pep talks, picking up report cards, hoping his athletic programs -- including 27 baseball teams named after African tribes -- will build self-esteem and pride. But he knows he can do only so much. "Everybody wants to jump up and down on the police. They're not the ones committing the crimes. The parents, the aunties, the uncles, are the ones that need to be involved, instead of pulling their shades down until it happens to them." At Cabrini, mothers teach their children more than manners, respect and the importance of sharing. Other lessons seem far more urgent: How to steer clear of windows in case of shootings. How to avoid the clutch of gangs. How to stay alive. Just ask Bernetta Winston, a stocky mother of two boys, 12 and 14. "You sit them down and say: 'Gangs will get you nothing but trouble; they'll get you in jail or 6 feet under,' " she declares in her don't-mess-with-me tone. ' "Go to school. Get an education and get out of here. Make a choice.' They'd better make the right one." More than half of Cabrini's 7,000 residents are younger than 20. Many are raised by single mothers in surroundings where hope sometimes is as scarce as work. Only 9% of residents have paying jobs. To succeed here, it sometimes takes special steps. Valerie Woolridge sent her 21-year-old son away when gangs started pressuring him and shot and burned his car. Woolridge is a stylish woman, with dangling earrings and a dash of fuchsia-tinted hair. She has lived here all of her 39 years, but says it's nothing like her childhood days when kids played outside freely. "It's the way you raise kids that matter. Give them support . . . don't beat on them, don't curse them out." She knows that some parents here can't control their children. And some parents can't control themselves, trading food stamps for crack or getting high in front of their babies. But Woolridge, who helps run a Chicago Urban League after-school program for children, emphasizes that many, many more people here are law-abiding, struggling to make it. "There's a lot of good over here. Some of the people just need a chance. They never have a chance." * In 13 years as a cop at Cabrini-Green, Dennis Davis has seen folks come and go, violence flare up and die down. But there has been one constant: gangs. Driving through Cabrini's 70 acres, a mile from the city's elegant Gold Coast, Davis points to graffiti-scarred high-rises and identifies which gang controls which building -- the Disciples, Vice Lords or Cobra Stones. Gangs here have power, selling drugs, protecting turf. Sometimes it seems easier to live by their rules. "You either join the gangs or get beat up," says Davis, a soft-spoken 21-year police veteran. "What choice do you have? You can't be beat up every day." Davis knows one young man who can't find work and holes up in his apartment every day except Sunday, to go to church, because he doesn't want to get involved. When he first began working here, Davis says, the complex -- 23 high-rises and about 60 row houses -- was mostly occupied. Now the vacancy rate is 31%. Some buildings were sealed and vacated recently in a new security crackdown announced by Mayor Richard M. Daley that also included police sweeps of high-rises for drugs and weapons. "A lot of people don't like it," says Davis, a neighborhood relations officer. "They feel like they're in a prison." This isn't Cabrini's first 15 minutes of fame. In 1981, then-Mayor Jane M. Byrne moved here for three weeks to dramatize crime conditions. Eleven years later, the killing goes on. Asked if the stepped-up security will work, Davis says quietly: "We'll just have to wait and see. It's better than nothing. . . . It's sad it took a 7-year-old kid to bring about this." For the children, Dantrell's death was sad and scary, but it wasn't shocking. And it raised a terrible question: Will I be next? Those who attend an Urban League after-school program in the building where Dantrell lived expressed their fears and feelings on paper. "Too many people (are) getting killed over here in Cabrini and I am tired of it," wrote 12-year-old Erica Morris. "Because I may be the next one, but I am not going to say that. I want to move away from the projects." Erica, with her delicate features and whisper-shy voice, dreams of becoming a veterinarian. For now, she offers a suggestion for the random shooting. "They should do it some other time," she says evenly. "Not while kids go to school." Her sister, Angel, 8, also worries. "I never got shot before, but I think I will or someone in my family will or someone in a lot of families will too," the third-grader wrote. Some children's letters were pleas for help. "Sometimes I am afraid to go to school," Orion wrote in his 7-year-old's scrawl. "We little people need some protection from all gang violence and drug sellers." But others were more fatalistic. "When a boy gotten shot I . . . tell God to help him, to let him be in your hands, let him be with you," wrote 9-year-old Rennard. "Just like they say -- the odds be with you and you be with the odds." GRAPHIC: Photo, Al Carter, who grew up in project, listens to coach Leon Boyd at basketball court on edge of Chicago's Cabrini-Green housing project. Valerie Woolridge helps run Urban League's after-school activities center there. Associated Press 4 1994 Crim Pro Exam Materials