On stirring a hornet’s nest, part 1

Growing up, we had a hive of bees that elected to take up residence in the eave of our house. They would come and go as they pleased, never causing any harm. A few times, they would swarm and we simply gave them a wide berth until they calmed down. We left them alone and they never bothered us.

For a while now, I have been engaged with various city entities in an attempt to bring light to a growing situation within our community: an explosion of crime fueled by fentanyl. We have all seen it throughout our town and it pulls at my heartstrings. Everywhere you look, people stagger about, openly using drugs, exhibiting wildly chaotic mannerisms and wasting away in the elements and their illnesses.

In my naïveté, I assumed Las Cruces would have concrete means to help these people. An emergency shelter for immediate mental health or substance use stabilization? Very limited. Legal interventions to involuntarily commit someone suffering a crisis so that they couldn’t harm themselves further? If they’re lucky. Surely, at least, there are laws to keep the ones victimizing others away from society for a period long enough to detox? Quite the opposite, in fact.

The truth is, we, as a society, have cast these people aside. The politicians, in a place to affect real change, wish instead to hide behind party lines and continue to enable these people to kill themselves and our city. Those opposed to this ridiculous stance are branded as political traitors or extremists and cancelled outright. There is no common-sense middle ground. Which leaves the citizens with the impossible choice to have our empathy taken advantage of, or to fight against the death of our city. 

I have reported a number of encampments myself and pushed to have them cleaned up, not just to rid myself of an eyesore as I drive by in my air-conditioned vehicle, but rather to try to help the people living in horrid conditions, likely unable, for whatever reason, to ask for help themselves.

One particular area exploded over the summer. At its height, this area became an obvious mecca for prostitution, drug use and stolen property. The nearby grocery store’s bread cart, at one point, was commandeered to provide something of a silk screen to hide illegal activity, albeit not very well.

After a number of reports, police responded en masse to roust the squatters from the city property. The city sent out a cadre of resources to assist in the clean-up. Multiple dump trucks, front-end loaders, an army of city employees, chainsaws and brush-clearing equipment were employed for several days before the decision was made to halt the cleanup for safety reasons. So prolific was the human waste and drug paraphernalia that it was no longer safe for the city workers to continue.

It occurred to me then, in a wave of guilt, that my complaints had put innocent lives at risk. The police officers had to engage with erratic and potentially dangerous people in that encampment. A city employee could have accidentally stepped on a used needle. Did the cleanup drive a violent drug addict into the nearby neighborhood?

I still struggle for the right answer. If we complain, perhaps the criminals will move on, out of town and out of our lives. But the analogy of stirring the hornet’s nest lives on: should I just leave well enough alone?

The answer, we will discuss next week, is no.