Here’s a tip for the newspaper and the Mayor: there is no pot of gold at the end of the rainbow.

The Times published a story rrecently that showed our Mayor and two paid staffers on a junket in Las Vegas talking to shopping center builders about economic development. The story mentioned two other mayors in attendance out of the thousands of mayors across the United States.

So while crime was growing and families were sitting in Shreveport worrying about their property values depreciating and the sound of sirens in the night, our Mayor was in another casino town deluding himself into thinking that solutions for economic development will be found somewhere else.

Our police department is stretched too thin. There aren’t enough officers on patrol and the calls for assistance are increasing as the response times increase creating an even greater atmosphere of instability. While two city employees lurked in the background trolling for economic opportunities, the Mayor admitted that there were no concrete ideas or plans. This causes one to wonder why there was a story in the first place.

A political and journalistic junket to Las Vegas is news, how? Standing around and walking through stalls and hearing pitches from carnival-like vendors brings nothing and proves nothing except that our Mayor is naïve and the newspaper would cover him if he passed gas.

How telling were some of the comments as one of the vendors pointed out that generally speaking mayors have too much to do to attend events like the one in Vegas. The problem is judgment and this administration’s lack of judgment. The very idea of sending our mayor on a trip like this shows nobody at City Hall has a plan.

The key to bringing businesses and jobs here is simply making our city safe. Making our city safe means making public safety the top priority. Making public safety the top priority will require cranking down the spin machine and actually getting a real plan together instead of constant crisis management.

Want to bring in new businesses and jobs? Create an environment in Shreveport where businesses and families are safe. Begin with a real manpower study to find a way to get more police officers on the streets of Shreveport.