If you took the time from your busy schedule to attend last Tuesday’s community forum at the old St. Steve’s gymnasium over in the Sheffield neighborhood, pat yourself on the back and congratulate yourself. The forum was well organized, expertly moderated (ahem) and extremely well attended by over 125 Northeast residents who wanted to engage their civic leaders.

Additionally, the Dog would like to thank the five City Council people (Lucas, Reed, Justus, Shields, Wagner), City Manager Troy Schulte, Police Chief Rick Smith, East Patrol Commander Jim Thomas, COMBAT Director Vince Ortega and former State Representative John Burnett pinch-hitting for his wife and current District 19 State Rep Ingrid Burnett, who is now in session. It’s not often community forums are this heavily attended by area policy-makers, and the strong showing is testament that local officials are concerned with what our community has to say and the direction it is taking.

Lastly, this community-minded, news writing canine wants to say thanks to those in attendance for not denigrating the forum with the time-dishonored tactics of the old Communities Creating Opportunity (CCO) meetings held in the basement of Assumption Parish in the early 1990s. All too often those hostile gatherings held public officials hostage under a bare bulb while CCO operatives whipped the attending crowd into a frenzy. This Dog remembers Police intervening on a couple of occasions just to keep injuries from being inflicted. Note: we weren’t big on the CCO Texas Strap Match tactics then and we’re not too keen on their hard-left bullying tactics these days either, but that’s a screed for another day.

In the end, Northeast was well represented and for one, this NewsDog wants to issue a big thank you to all the panelists who gave of their time to address the community – along with a positive shout out to the Northeast community for keeping it classy.