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[GK86]

RIP Mike Brown.

Guarding Mike Brown's memorial:

Full article here.

Improvements here are undeniable. The local, state and federal authorities point to new programs and new laws enacted since the unrest, including increased funds for job training and college assistance, and legislation lowering the percentage of revenue Missouri cities can make from traffic fines and fees — described by Gov. Jay Nixon as “the most sweeping municipal court reform in state history.”

...

Perhaps most significant, city leaders say they have revamped their municipal court system, replacing the longtime judge, and two widely criticized practices: holding people in jail for days on minor offenses when they could not post bonds, and piling on new “failure to appear” charges against those who miss court.

A sea of ideas considered by a state-appointed Ferguson Commission, including raising the minimum wage and consolidating tiny police departments, remain proposals. Similarly, the Missouri legislature considered more than 20 bills to change law enforcement policies, but only one — the new cap on traffic ticket revenues — passed.

Perhaps most telling, on the streets near the apartment complexes where Mr. Brown died, people say they feel just as estranged from the police as they did a year ago, just as skeptical of this city’s leaders — black or white.

“The mind-set is still that it’s normal to have the police stop African-Americans and harass us and shake us down,” said Phil Gassoway, a Ferguson resident and regular at local demonstrations. “That’s the norm — still is. There’s no change nowhere.”

Along West Florissant, several stores have shuttered for good, stray garbage blows across lots filled with broken glass and graffiti covers the wooden boards. Many of the shoppers here come from nearby apartment complexes that house some of the city’s poorest residents. Among them: Canfield Green, where Mr. Brown died and where demonstrations boiled over night after night. It has not helped West Florissant that some of the complexes have lost occupants, their residents fleeing to get away from the discord.

“Business is absolutely not back,” said Jay L. Kanzler Jr., a lawyer who represents some shop owners. “The people who have come back are there only because they put their blood, sweat and tears into it.”

On the other side of town, along South Florissant Road, fewer traces of the violence remain. Owners here say business is returning, and that a developer has even pitched a project of apartments and stores in the area. Already home to a wine bar and bakery, a cigar bar moved in not long ago. So did a new restaurant, J&C BBQ and Blues.

One of the newer storefronts offers a counterpoint to the once-nightly protests outside the police station. The I Love Ferguson store is jammed with merchandise that declares just that: “I ♥ Ferguson” shirts, caps and cups, even a children’s photo book, “Painting for Peace in Ferguson” (for $15.95), of murals painted on boarded-up businesses here last year.

Run by a nonprofit that donates its proceeds — more than $100,000 so far — to community causes, the group began with simple yard signs promoted by a white former mayor who in April won a spot on the City Council. Some demonstrators and black residents see that message as a rejection of urgent calls for change, but group members see things differently.

Tony Rice, a local activist who led the unsuccessful push to recall Mr. Knowles, scoffed at what he viewed as the cynicism of the city’s rush to announce interim hires. “This is almost the most backwards-thinking thing you can think of — running out and getting a black police chief, a black city manager and a black judge,” he said.

“Every time they’ve made a move to do something for the community they were pushed and dragged to do it,” Mr. Rice said. “Somebody forcing you to change is not change.”

City officials also assert that a culture change is underway in the Police Department. Officers wear body cameras, and beat officers have begun attending neighborhood meetings. With the help of a consultant, the department plans by January to reorganize schedules and beats so that all officers focus on developing closer bonds with the neighborhoods they patrol, Mayor Knowles said.

In the mostly African-American neighborhood of low-slung rental apartment complexes near where Mr. Brown died, the mayor’s views are not widely shared.

People here say the police still treat residents suspiciously, still bark questions, still make arrests for what they consider trivial charges.

“They hassle you for no reason at all,” said Ms. West, the woman who was among those summoned to appear in Ferguson’s municipal courtroom one evening last month.

City officials say Ms. West was cited for “failure to comply” and making a false police report. She was also arrested on an outstanding warrant, according to records, because she owed $77 of an earlier fine for stealing a shower curtain and shower hooks worth about $29.

Ms. West, 21, tells a somewhat different story of the recent arrest. She said she was arguing with her boyfriend outside her apartment in May when an officer approached. They told the officer there was nothing wrong, she said. “He told me if I didn’t give him my Social Security number, he was going to lock me up — and he did,” she said.

In its critique of Ferguson, the Justice Department singled out the “failure to comply” ordinance — which requires people to identify themselves to the police — as a violation that Ferguson’s police officers routinely used to arrest people without proper cause.

 

[Tagyhag]

Fuck, it feels like it was at the start of the year.

It's been a year, and nothing has changed.

 

[Africanus]

A damn shame. And already his memory has faded from the public sphere.

 

[WaffleTaco]

A damn shame. And already his memory has faded from the public sphere.

Do you really think that? Maybe it's because it's in my area, but Ferguson is still talked about a lot in my opinion. Maybe not in the news(what else can people really say at this point?) but definitely with the locals in the greater St Louis area.

It really is a shame for what happened, and i hope his family is doing ok.

 

[Africanus]

Do you really think that? Maybe it's because it's in my area, but Ferguson is still talked about a lot in my opinion. Maybe not in the news(what else can people really say at this point?) but definitely with the locals in the greater St Louis area.

It really is a shame for what happened, and i hope his family is doing ok.

Well therein lies the point. Of course one's mileage may vary, but I feel the proximity is a factor.

When I speak of public sphere, I think of the fact that no lessons were learned, and no significant change was enacted in response to police treating citizens of the Middle West like terrorists do in the Middle East.

 

[maxcriden]

Very sad. I was listening to a story about the witness being given less and less credibility from people, and a new interview he'd done about how he's had to stay away from the public eye. From how he was portrayed in the story, to me he didn't stand out as lacking credibility as a witness.

 

[ElectricBlanketFire]

Still more to be done.