In late June, Mayor Barrett signed the gang loitering ordinance, the same ordinance he threatened to veto last year. He waited until the last-minute before signing the measure the same day Summerfest began its 11-day run.

Politicians have a bad habit of releasing information or signing bills late on Friday afternoons or, in this case, opening day of the world's largest music festival, when they don't want the media to report it. Instead, Barrett chose to allow his office to keep citizens guessing about his stance until the 5 p.m. signing deadline. This ordinance, whether you supported it or not, was a harbinger of the type of leadership emanating from the mayor's office and his lukewarm, almost apathetic, support spoke volumes.

As Bob Marley sang, "You can fool some people sometimes, but you can't fool all the people all of the time..."

Barrett's continued lack of proactive tactics to address the crime crisis in our city is inexcusable. His flaks can pontificate until they turn blue in the face about having "a plan" and "rolling up his sleeves" but the truth is that crime has not subsided since the day he took office, nor have the safety issues in MPS been challenged. He can appoint all the blue-ribbon crime committees he wants but in order to curb the rise in crime he needs to react before the crimes take place, not after. I believe this lack of vision and foresight is a result of his lack of law enforcement experience, he's a career politician, not a zero tolerance, iron fist when it comes to crime.

Barrett, like me, lives in the City of Milwaukee but I am convinced that he rarely leaves the confines of Downtown to truly see crime where it happens. Fortunately, violent crime Downtown is rare but it's happening in many other places and Barrett needs to be the daily icon in the fight against crime instead of the afterthought. How could former New York Mayor Giuliani drastically reduce crime in New York yet Barrett can't do the same in a city with a fraction of the population and the high-crime area confined to a defined section of Milwaukee.

What's even more sad is that Mayor Barrett appears to be getting a free pass into serving another four years. As of today there are no announced candidates to take on the current mayor in the April 2008 election. Prominent names on the short list of potential candidates include Common Council President Willie Hines, Congresswoman Gwen Moore, WHEDA Executive Director Antonio Riley and Milwaukee County Sheriff David Clarke.

Hines has shown exemplary leadership at times and could well further that as mayor. He has a great rapport and respect with his constituents as well as those outside of his district. Riley undoubtedly also has salient experience as head of WHEDA addressing the issues of central city residents.

While she grew up in Milwaukee's central city, Moore has been largely off the Milwaukee scene while in Washington D.C. She has, instead, chosen to protest the United States' lack of action in Sudan (Darfur) and telling companies like BuySeasons that their jobs aren't good enough for central city Milwaukeeans, allowing those jobs to go to back to the suburbs. That's not exactly the type of leadership needed by Milwaukeeans. Unfortunately, none of the above, except for Clarke, has any direct law enforcement experience which I believe is needed to begin to reverse the current trends in our central city.

Barrett seems to enjoy appearing at press conferences where he can puff out his chest with other bureaucrats in offering shallow promises while the victims of crimes continue to sit on the sidelines and ask why.

Our city deserves a leader who can create and manage change. Our city deserves good, proactive leadership that's also tough on crime.