Facts trickle in on abandoned baby

Today's Globe, Herald and NECN have stories with a bit more information on the newborn found abandoned in an alley off Saratoga Street. Mother and child are each apparently at Mass. General hospital and in good condition, though the baby is in state custody. It's unclear at this point if charges will be filed against the mother, who neighbors say was clearly trying to hide the fact that she was pregnant.

Photo courtesy Boston.com.

Lots to do

***ZUMIX is sponsoring a series of concerts in East Boston parks this summer. For example, tomorrow evening a duet called Sweet and Lowdown will perform from 5 to 7 p.m. at Bremen Street Park. Check here to see a schedule of performances.

***The Boston Biennial 2009, a juried exhibition of contemporary art, will be presented at the Atlantic Works Gallery, just outside of Maverick Square, from Aug. 6 to 22. Check here for more information at the gallery's web site.

***The new Maverick Station is scheduled to open on Sunday, and a week-long series of music and entertainment is planned to welcome people back to the square. Check out the press release at EastBoston.com for more information.

***The 21st annual Eastie Pride Day -- Saturday, Aug. 15 at Piers Park -- will feature music, food and fun activities for children. The event's web site is here.

***Volunteers are needed to help remove some graffiti from murals along the East Boston Greenway. Email candice@bostonnatural.org if you'd like to help.

It's a crime

The Globe has a story today about the hazards of summer -- skin cancer, Lyme disease, EEE, West Nile, etc. -- and how they've been overblown, causing widespread worry when the dangers are relatively tiny. This idea is a microcosm of a bigger problem in our society: we worry too much about the wrong things.

Recently I heard Lenore Skenazy, author of a book called Free-Range Kids, on NPR and she cited crime figures that show that, as a rule, children are as safe today as they were when their parents were growing up. Crime did rise for a decade beginning in the mid-1980s, but the number of murders, assaults, rapes and abductions are way down in recent years. The perception, however, is that we live in crazy times and that children need to be chained to their parents.

This paranoia is fostered by local news and true-crime TV shows, but it isn't reality. Of course, every child -- every person -- who is the victim of a crime is one too many, but American parents seem consumed by the idea that a stranger is going to leap out and snatch their kid. Any review of the facts will show that when children are abducted or harmed it is almost always a relative or close friend; when they are reported missing it often turns out that they've run away or that they're with dad.

I remember going to see Michael Moore's film Bowling for Columbine and thinking that it'd be a liberal crusade against guns -- a crusade I support -- but the theme was actually quite different. Moore has been an NRA member since he was a teenager. His movie focuses on the fear that many Americans have that someone is going to burst through their door to attack them, rob them and/or hold them hostage. Again, this is an irrational fear. That is not to say that it never happens, but that it is extremely rare. Watching local TV news and true-crime shows, however, you'd think it happens every other day in your town.

As a result, people in the United States arm themselves with all sorts of weaponry and fight against laws that would exercise some control of their armaments. In the movie, Moore crosses the border and walks around Toronto -- a big urban center -- and into people's homes. Turns out they don't lock their doors as often in Canada because they don't fear crime the way we do. They aren't bombarded with fearmongering on the tube every day.

Yes, I know: crime does happen, and it can be devastating, but I don't believe that we should let the way we live be controlled by TV stations desperate for higher ratings.

A beautiful day

Late yesterday afternoon I went to visit my mom for a bit and when I drove past Bremen Street Park there were, without exaggeration, hundreds and hundreds of people there. Mostly they were children on the swings and other play elements, but there were also young and old adults walking, sitting and hanging out.

It was a refreshing image of urban life, and I immediately thought of this blog and how -- on any issue concerning East Boston -- there are comments that rant in completely negative terms about the neighborhood, the people, the businesses, the politicians. I think that we all should stop and sniff the proverbial flowers. We live in a place that is cool, diverse and safe. Yes, the streets are sometimes dirty; a neighbor can sometimes be annoying; we're not without crime or a gang element or an issue that city government should have responded to more quickly. Reading over the comments, however, one would think that Eastie is the South Bronx in the 1970s.

So let's enjoy the arrival of spring. As the prophet Bono says, "It's a beautiful day / Don't let it get away."

The spirit of giving

The Jeffries Point Neighborhood Association and 303 Cafe are running a Toys for Tots drive "to help needy children throughout the Boston area experience the joy of Christmas." The cafe, located at 303 Sumner Street in East Boston, will be accepting toys through this weekend, so get into the spirit of giving by helping some less fortunate youngsters. In the photo, Hayes Morrison, Lynnette and Ruth Weening take part in the toy drive.

Alert fever?

We've had two Amber Alerts in Massachusetts in the past few days, each in tandem with New York State, where the non-custodial dad went in one case and appeared to in another.

This morning we have a case that seems like it could have been the third in four days, when an estranged father grabbed his two-year-old daughter in Chicopee and headed for the Mass. Pike. However, would you believe there is squabbling among the two states' Amber systems?

Authorities asked police in New York to issue an Amber Alert for the toddler after learning that her father was headed for that state. Chicopee police said the girl is in danger because she requires medication.

Authorities in New York said the case did not meet their requirements for issuing an Amber Alert, particularly because an alert was not issued in Massachusetts.

State Police said an alert was not issued here because authorities acquired information showing that the father was headed out of state.

Beyond the double-take that this story produces is the article that was in the Sunday Globe on July 27, entitled: "Abducted!: The Amber Alert system is more effective as theater than as a way to protect children."

The piece, by Globe staffer Drake Bennett, looks at a study by the University of Nevada that concludes that Amber Alerts give people a false sense of being an effective tool, where in reality it almost never helps save children.

After looking at hundreds of cases in recent years the study confirmed that all but a handful of these are non-custodial parents and most of those were solved within a week even before the Amber system was created. In the nightmare case of a stranger kidnapping a child with intent to do harm, the alerts are almost never effective because the crime usually occurs within the first three hours.

Of course, any time we can do something that will save a child's life we should. However, our society has created this climate of fear because it's good for law-and-order politicians and because it's good for TV news profits. America's Most Wanted, Amber Alerts, tabloid newspapers, the Lifetime Network and local news stations feed into the mentality that the stranger down the street is coming for your kid.

In reality, of the hundreds of thousands of kids reported missing each year (according to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, with the vast majority being teen runaways), fewer than 100 (according to FBI numbers) are abducted by strangers, a total that has been falling in recent years, despite public fears. And one wonders how many of those are teenagers who went to meet someone they connected with online, rather than someone grabbing a child in a bedroom or forcing him into a van.

The same atmosphere of fear is what causes an elderly woman I know to dangerously store gasoline for her lawn mower in the cellar of her home. When told of the escaping fumes and the danger of explosion, she said that if it was stored in the back yard a stranger might come along and burn her house down. She was willing to accept the real danger for fear of the one created in her mind by crime shows.

The story goes on to say that other policies -- like "three strikes" sentencing and sex-offender registries -- are political in nature, create false calm, are costly and do little. I am not advocating eliminating the latter (while the former is clearly outrageous) or of discontinuing Amber Alerts. The study's author, Tim Griffin, says that his research is preliminary, and what I am saying is that we should continue to study, discuss and think about such public policies now and in the future.

What annoys me to no end is the idea that we cannot question, study and discuss this or any program or policy, as though it's become some type of sacred cow. The Globe immediately received a letter from Texas in response to the story that said, "It's beyond comprehension that someone who is looking at statistics and a spread sheet can conclude that there is no value in Amber Alerts..." How else would we determine that?