Neighbors of the Sargento Cabral neighborhood gathered this Thursday in front of the Municipality of Santa Fe to demand greater lighting and police patrols and the municipal Institutional Security Guard (GSI). The protesters carried a document signed by 460 residents of the neighborhood located in the geographical heart of the city in which they also requested the repair of the streets and the cleaning of the drains.
“We need them to finish the LED lighting installation work that Jatón (Emilio, former mayor) left 100 meters from the neighborhood,” said Roberto, one of Sargento Cabral’s neighbors who approached the Municipality this Thursday. “Due to the insecurity we are experiencing in the neighborhood, lighting means a lot to us,” he added.
“It seems that our mayor (Juan Pablo Poletti) is giving priority to other works that I believe are necessary, but it seems to me that lighting, patching the streets, unclogging the drains and weeding are priorities.”
-Does this translate into greater criminal acts in the neighborhood?
“Yes,” answered the neighbor, “absolutely.” We have a large number of criminal acts in the neighborhood, which is a neighborhood in which there are a large number of schools, churches, clubs and other institutions that give it great movement and activity, and people cannot move around at night.
Later the neighbor said: “A minister of Governor Pullaro lives in the neighborhood. I’m not going to say his name but he is top of the line. And the minister was robbed twice through the roof. He has not reported it. We know that he is a very good person. But we want to tell the mayor with this that ‘the bomb is going to explode in his hand,’” he warned.
-Is there sufficient police presence in the area?
“The police presence is very little, scarce,” answered Manuel, another of the neighbors who approached the Municipality. Very occasionally a patrol car appears or a cell phone is seen passing by. So, I say: where are the police phones they bought? Where did they go? Because they are not in the police stations.
-Do criminal events occur at any particular time?
-At any time there are people walking around or feeling for doorknobs or wanting to climb onto the roofs. It is throughout the Sargento Cabral neighborhood. The kids walk by, sometimes begging, and feel for the doorknobs. They also ride motorcycles at full speed, in the morning, afternoon and at night. “This is terrible,” the neighbor concluded.
