OPINION:
If you’re in the customer service business, as I am, trust between you and your clients is vital. Trust is the result of a sense of safety and comfort. So it should be obvious to all that when there is rampant crime, trust — whether real or imagined — will be compromised, drying up revenue streams (“D.C. braces for funding crisis as the downtown area struggles financially,” web, March 15).
Amazingly, many people, including city officials, are surprised by this turn of events. But they need to wake up. A fiscal crisis is a warning that our city services are facing a decline. If “White flight” occurs in real estate, “economic flight” is starting to emerge in D.C.’s business district. Trust has a price.
There have been three years of defunding the police, and business traffic and customer attendance still have not returned. Continued work-from-home policies for government employees have not helped. And our City Council hides behind crime statistics so it won’t have to use more police enforcement.
As a downtown resident, I have even cut back on nighttime dining, and my friends only want to come to the city during the day.
When we fail to prosecute criminals due to “the optics” (because most of those arrested would be African American males), trust is eroded. Although the city is now reversing the laws that resulted in the current economic conditions, taking residents’ trust for granted can be very costly, which is what businesses are experiencing. Residents have changed their living and dining habits, and less time and money spent in downtown D.C. has resulted in lost tax revenue.
D.C. officials have a false sense of entitlement if they thought larger businesses would continue to pay property and other taxes while simply tolerating rising crime levels, or if they thought these companies would be deceived by an ever-changing interpretation of crime statistics. Unfortunately, with the new fiscal crisis facing the city, D.C. must rebalance its priorities. Trust must be earned.
GREG RALEIGH
Washington
Please read our comment policy before commenting.