Camden Neighborhood Cleanup Designed To Drive Out Lowlifes
By Paul Kurtz
CAMDEN, N.J. (CBS) - In Camden today, police and other city agencies joined forces to clean up a blighted neighborhood that has become a magnet for criminal activity.
A bulldozer scrapes up mounds of trash while Public Works landscapers whacked the weeds that had completely overtaken an abandoned lot at Mt. Vernon and Broadway. Across the street, crews clear an abandoned car wash of the debris left behind by illegal dumpers.
Camden County Police Captain Gabriel Camacho says the area is more than an eyesore:
"Actually it attracts criminal activity. Prostitution, assaults to drug activity is going on in these kinds of areas. You got high brush, high trees, as far as officers going by or even residents going by they don't know what's going on here."
Camacho says over the last year officers responded to more than 300 crimes.
Without their cover, he believes, the criminals will scatter like cockroaches. What remains to be seen is whether they become another neighborhoods problem.
