If a stranger saw a crowd of drunken rowdies passing along one of the respectable thoroughfares of Norwood after dark, singing and using loud and vulgar language he would say “Where are the police and what can they be thinking of to allow such actions ?”
This is a natural question but the answer is that the police are doing their duty as authorized by the citizens of the town. The next question would be, •‘What do the citizens of the town authorize, that the duties of the police shall be? ”
The true Norwood citizen then hangs his head and in answer to the stranger’s question says: “We have one night police officer whose duty it is to patrol the section of Washington Street between Guild Street and Railroad Avenue. He has no way of seeing what is going on in any other part of the town but is simply responsible for what happens in the village.”
This is the true state of affairs in Norwood, a town with over fifty miles of streets, of which less than half a mile is patrolled at night by police. A few weeks ago, a man was left for dead by a crowd of drunken men in a clump of bushes near the corner of Washington and Dean streets, and but for some of the neighbors who saw the act, the man would today lie resting in the cemetery.
The children in a certain section of the town have lately caused considerable disturbance, and although the police attended to the matter as soon as notified, it was not until they had committed several rather serious crimes. If a policeman were in the habit of patrolling that section, day and night, the children would not have dared to act as they did.
What the town should have is more police officers and then, perhaps the residents of some sections of the town other than the village, might feel that they are getting some return for the money they are paying the town in taxes for the support of the police force.