Rogers Park already has a serious problem with illegal drugs. Street sales are still brisk in this Chicago neighborhood, along the shore of Lake Michigan. You can get your pot, weed, meth, crack, coke, and other stuff easily.What has not been easy to obtain until now is the paraphernalia to go along with it.
Until now. Rogers Park just got a shiny new bong shop. Windy City Glass offers "glass pipes, water pipes and tabacco [sic] accessories" for the discerning stoner.Will there be a ribbon cutting ceremony for one of Rogers Park's newest businesses? Will DevCorp North and Alderman Joe Moore (49th Ward) come around to welcome this new business?
The bong store is conveniently located at N. Sheridan and W. Pratt, just two blocks north of the Loyola CTA Red Line station, and right behind a CTA bus stop.Neighbors in the Pratt Beach Apartments must be thrilled to know that they need only go downstairs to get a new bong. Sitting on the patio of Panini Panini coffee shop next door suddenly feels a bit more like cafe society Amsterdam style.
This is easy to laugh at, but it's actually not very funny. An excellent report by Tasneem Nomanbhai at Chi-Town Daily News highlights the drug and related gang activity problems here in Rogers Park (highlighting and emphasis are added):Drug and gang activity continue to frustrate residents of the Rogers Park beat 2422. At Thursday's regular CAPS meeting, Officer Michael Riordan told residents that patrol officers on the beat are targeting the problem areas, particularly near Howard and Clark streets and in the area of the nearby shopping mall.
Crime statistics for the beat this month show 15 narcotics arrests, 14 trespassing arrests, 5 arrests related to property damage, 8 arrests for retail theft, 6 arrests for thefts from buildings, four arrest for assault, 10 arrests for battery, 10 domestic battery arrests and 4 arrests for possession of drug paraphernalia. Full article here...Alderman Moore had to sign off on the Windy City Glass business license. He cannot say he is unaware of it. (However, a few days ago he stopped into Grill Inn, a beautiful new sandwich shop on Morse Avenue that opened five months ago. He was overheard to ask an employee, "How long have you been open?")
Moore already has a public relations problem with liquor stores in the ward. After more than 16 years as the ward's alderman, Moore is strong arming Soo Liquors on Morse Avenue to restrict or prohibit the sale of malt liquors, cheap wines and small cigars. The cigars are often converted to "blunts," hollowed out and stuffed with marijuana. Moore has been publicly embarrassed by his cozy relationship to another liquor store, El Mexicano, on Clark Street. The owner of El Mexicano got a pass on his promise to obey a moratorium similar to what is now being imposed on Soo Liquors, and it was discovered that the owner contributed $1,000 to Moore's 2007 reelection campaign.
Alderman Moore, then, has an interesting challenge: While telling - virtually ordering - liquor stores such as Soo Liquors that they must not sell malt liquor, he allows a drug paraphernalia store, a bong shop, to open on a highly visible corner underneath an apartment building. Perhaps, five months from now, Moore will stop in to check out the merchandise and ask them how long they have been open. In the meantime, Mr. Moore is so busy campaigning for Barack Obama outside of Illinois that he has not had the time - or desire - to pay attention to the important matters here in his own ward. Perhaps Mr. Moore will tend to this after the November election. Perhaps not.
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