Does it take a visitor to put words to something that is rarely discussed? Apparently.
Robert Jones, chief of the Kingsland, Ga., Police Department, came in on Sunday as the lone candidate left standing among a total of 39 applications received by Pine Bluff for the city's police chief position. From then until Tuesday, when he went back to Georgia, he was on public view, answering questions, talking about himself, telling us what makes him tick and what makes for good and bad policing.
On Tuesday, at a gathering at Simmons Bank sponsored by Go Forward Pine Bluff, he met with business leaders and city officials and answered still more questions.
During that extended conversation, he said he had joined the Marines a few days after graduating high school and stayed in the ranks for six years. Then, years later, he joined the Army Reserves after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks and was sent off to do battle.
So it's clear that his capacity to commit to things that are important to him runs deep.
But it was his comments about gangs that may have opened a few eyes. The subject had come up as part of other questions, but then Jones was asked to describe specifically what he was seeing in Pine Bluff.
He was quick to say that he could see the gang "tags" all over town. Another term for gang tags is gang graffiti, or writings and symbols to show that this or that particular piece of turf belongs to a specific gang.
In short, he said, yes, our city has a gang problem, and the first thing we need to do is get rid of the graffiti around town. In doing that, he said, you show the gangs that no, this is not your turf, it's Pine Bluff's turf, and you are not welcome here.
The subject of gangs is rarely mentioned by city officials and certainly not in the open. So while it was a bit disconcerting to hear of the magnitude of the gang problem here, at least in the eyes of someone who has only been here for a few hours, it was also encouraging that the person who might be in a position to do something about that problem recognizes it as easily as if it were a shiny penny on a sidewalk.
He had another quick perspective on the problem: Pine Bluff needs help with it. It's too much for the city to battle by itself, he said, and we need state, if not federal, task force resources to get it under control. Just like that: There's the problem, and here's a possible solution.
Not that it's going to be easy, he said. Far from it. But no one expected the new person to come in and snap their fingers and make Pine Bluff squeaky clean of crime.
Which raises the question: Has this been the problem all along? Gangs and gang influences? Have we been swimming upstream on this whole matter for years? It makes one wonder. And really, how are we going to cooperate and put together partnerships if we aren't all aware of and soberly focusing on the biggest problem facing us?
The fact that the potential new guy was so quick on the uptake was enough for our thumbs-up. Not that we get a vote, but he looks good to us.