“As the Oakwood City Council Committee Chair for Safety & Traffic, I feel the responsibility to remark on this issue. I have lived in Oakwood my entire life, excluding the four years I lived in Cincinnati and Cleveland immediately following college. I know we all have opinions as to why this is such a special community, but there is one consistent factor that I’m sure everyone can not only agree on, but also value as #1 for all of our citizens.....public safety.

We are very fortunate that we live in a community that is only 2.2 square miles, because it allows for our special cross-trained safety department. Due to our small size, we can maintain this department and receive the benefits. Our officers can be at any home or business in an extremely short amount of time. They can go into a home with a small kitchen fire and put it out immediately, they can react to a person having a health crisis and start medical response on the spot, and they can arrive at a home or business in need and immediately address any policing matter that is required.

We are fortunate to not have much “active” crime in Oakwood and that is due to our ability to police our streets and neighborhoods on a regular basis. We are able to devote the time and resources to police our streets and neighborhoods on a regular basis in part because we do not have much “active” crime in Oakwood. The reason we make traffic enforcement a high priority in our city is simple, it leads to a safe community, and we are fortunate that we can dedicate the personnel to this important task!

We are a walking community, not just our students, but our citizens love to walk and jog our beautiful streets. We are a major thoroughfare between the largest city in the Miami Valley and our south suburbs, and most importantly, we view traffic enforcement as a positive way to police our city. I find random license plate checks as a pro-active way to prevent crime. My guess is that some people in this room tonight have had their plates run as they were driving in our city and they were not pulled over. That is for one simple reason....they were not breaking the law. It’s very simple, if you don’t break the law you won’t be pulled over.

I find the comments that we may be pulling over one race more than another to be invalid. We most certainly don’t restrict anyone from driving in or through our town, buying a home in our town, or having a business in our town. We welcome all! We welcome everyone to use our streets and we simply ask that you obey the law. That goes for visitors AND residents, for all people. Due to our policing efforts, we are a safe community and I value that as a parent, friend, local businessman, volunteer, and Councilman in our wonderful city.”