and yes, we get it – you're brave for living in the big bad scary west end and recent transplants aren't down like u r.

and the comment above about privilege is pure drivel. try getting infuriated about MURDER instead of anything and everything that offends your little mind.

last thing – newsflash: the standard isn't in east atlanta. educate yourself.

rather than waiting for someone to make you aware of other groups who might be interested in working with you, do the legwork/homework yourself. I don't mean that to sound as nasty as it may come across in text, but if the fight against Prop 8 taught me anything, it's that activists can't sit around waiting for representatives from "other" communities to come calling, they have to be willing to show up, do some glad handing, and interact.

Thank you for saying that, Cecily. A big part of privilege is expecting other people to do your homework for you, or expecting that "others" exist in order to educate you. It rubs me the wrong way big time.

We have been actively reaching out to neighborhoods in the Atlanta Metro area since the inception of this organization. We will soon be looking for one representative per neighborhood in the Atlanta Metro area to act as the liaison between their neighborhood and ATAC. We aren't activists — we are concerned citizens. We are actively reaching out to new organizations and community leaders daily. We should be updating the site as soon as we start to flesh out more of the programs we are in the midst of coordinating.

Thanks so much for your input Cecily — we are totally open to suggestions. Please feel free to reach out to myself or either of my two co-founders at any time.

I want to be glass-half-full like Tiffany B., but part of me just finds it difficult to be that charitable.

I'll admit that I've been away from ATL going on 8 years now, so I'm not exactly up on what's changed now versus then, other than the demographic shift.

And Tessa, if I can make one small suggestion – rather than waiting for someone to make you aware of other groups who might be interested in working with you, do the legwork/homework yourself. I don't mean that to sound as nasty as it may come across in text, but if the fight against Prop 8 taught me anything, it's that activists can't sit around waiting for representatives from "other" communities to come calling, they have to be willing to show up, do some glad handing, and interact.

These types of incidents are happening ALL OVER the city.  Our organization was born out of the frustration that while crime is rising (and has been at very high levels for a very long time), police are being cut and bickering and blaming is taking part at the highest levels of city government instead of focusing on creative solutions to work towards handling this crime occurring in backyards across the entire city.

We have begun an effort to identify organizations within the neighborhoods of Atlanta that we can work with for this change.  This absolutely must be an effort on the part of all residents of Atlanta.  One of our objectives is to encourage diverse participation from everyone, regardless of location, race, ethnicity, sexual-preference, or socio-economic status.  This is a problem we ALL share.  If you are aware of any that we need to include, please let us know!

We appreciate the dialogue — it is valuable for us to know how Atlanta's citizens feel about our efforts.  If you ever have any further questions, complaints or so forth, feel free to contact us.  We are more than happy to listen.