Area 45

Time now for the de rigueur predictions for the coming year.  Raw data from the crystal ball and the Ouija board has been refined, analyzed and interpreted via a fail-safe, quasi-scientific principle employed by yours truly, to-wit:  It is impossible to be too cynical about all things Lake County.  So here goes:

  1.  The Maximus Report will dominate local political discussion.  Touted as the good government stairway to heaven and the piper that will lead us to civic reason, the Maximus Report (All Praise Be Upon It) will become a secular holy text, akin to The Thoughts of Chairman Mao, or Dianetics by L. Ron Hubbard.  Sales will skyrocket after its inclusion in Oprah’s Book Club.  Cult-like devotees will place a copy of the Report in the nightstand drawer of every motel room at I-65 and Route 30.   Selected passages from the text will be chanted in unison by cadres of students and civic activists.  Local news editors will take to the journalistic streets in rage after reports circulate that (1) a copy of the Maximus Report was flushed down a toilet at the Government Complex in Crown Point, and (2) a teddy bear was named after Maximus.  Meanwhile, Area 45 officialdom will take a two-pronged, two-faced approach to the Report. Publicly, officeholders will call for its implementation, albeit slowly under a Five-Year Plan; quietly, a political pogrom will begin, and public employees overheard uttering the name Maximus, or found in possession of the Report, will be whisked away to a secret gulag in New Chicago. 

2.  Grabbing some low-hanging fruit here, Gary will maintain its Yankee-like domination over the title of America’s murder capital.  It once was and still remains the “City on the Move” as scores of working families flee to the relative calm of Griffith, Crown Point, Merrillville and elsewhere.  All of which means that even if fewer homicides occur in Gary (as unlikely as that may be), the raw numbers will likely suffice to maintain its league-leading per capita murder rate.  Yet despite Gary’s celebrated status, the real front in the local war on crime has shifted to Merrillville, and Route 30 (the site of recent carjackings, motel murders and business robbery/murders) is the current battleline.  Not that the problem in Gary should be ignored, but if Merrillville can prevail against thugs, it will be a Gettysburg for Lake County.  If it doesn’t, it’s Dien Bien Phu. 

3.  Naysayers predict that Da Region’s economy will stagnate, at best.  That’s simply not true, and in fact the re-industrialization of Area 45 has already begun.  Put aside any visions you may have of brawny, soot-covered men laboring by the soft glow of a blast furnance.  Don’t let the past remind us of what we are not now.  But we are getting new factories.  Of a sort.  Three of the state’s ten worst-performing high schools - dubbed “dropout factories” - are located here.  And a huge trickle-down economic effect should result from a bevy of under-educated yoots.  Expect a banner year for career opportunities as a police officer, correctional officer, probation officer, prosecutor, defense attorney, bondsman, emergency room physician, alcohol/substance abuse counselor and the like.  And we’re not talking burger-flippin’ wages here; you too could become a $60,000/year probation investigator. 

4.  Opening Day of the Auto Show at McCormick Place will become the latest paid county holiday, thus affording Area 45 officials an ample opportunity to drool over the best and the brightest in take-home vehicles.  And expect the purchase of some tax-funded vehicle to finally break the much-vaunted $40,000 barrier.

Have a nice year. 

Addenda (01.02.08):  It’s certainly far too early for a self-administered pat-on-the-back, but just one day out of the box, some of yesterday’s predictions look particularly prescient:

1.  Today’s Post-Tribune notes the likelihood that Gary will lead the nation with its 2007 murder rate, with New Orleans running a close second.  But the fat lady has yet to sing, since the AP is reporting today that New Orleans - with both increased homicides and a declining population base - may yet eclipse what the AP calls “other notoriously bloody cities” like Gary.  Pending the final (body) count, this race is still too close to call.

2.  Look here for the first ‘08 local media genuflection before the Maximus Report.    

(O1/05/08):

3.   Right on cue, someone decides (in the parlance of the trade) to ‘hit a lick’ at another Route 30 business.

(01.06.08): 

4.  Today’s Post-Tribune notes the above-noted surge in violent crime in Merrillville.

(01.13.08):

5.  Damn it, Roy, you came so close.  If you’d just purchased the optional fur-covered floor mats, your new 5.3L, enviro-friendly monster truck would have broken the $40,000 barrier.   

This entry was posted on Tuesday, January 1st, 2008 at 7:11 pm and is filed under Dispatches. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.