Crime Watch: Website sales safety law heard in Senate committees, stalls in House

Once again I am getting emails from readers dealing with Craigslist sales, as to where they can go to meet these people.

Miami-Dade County Commissioner Sally Heyman has been working on legislation that will assist residents in being safe when buying or selling on Craigslist or any websites that deal with sales. Heyman, state Sen. Miguel Diaz de la Portilla, R-Miami, and state Rep. Barbara Watson, D-Miami Gardens, are proposing “safe haven” locations such as police departments, government buildings and courthouses for people to meet. The proposal would remove liability from public locations in order for people to meet.

The bill has been heard in two committees in the Senate but not in the House. Therefore, you the readers need to contact your senators and representative to please push for this bill so people can be safe when dealing with any classified advertisement website transaction. Folks, this is a super important piece of legislation, so please make that contact.

On other notes regarding Tallahassee, state Sen. Rene Garcia, R-Hialeah, is sponsoring funding for Citizens’ Crime Watch / Youth Crime Watch so that we may have funding to obtain crime prevention materials for our residents and youth since our budget was sliced again this year to the tune of $26,000. I sincerely hope that Republican Gov. Rick Scott doesn’t veto it like he did last year, because the need in educating our residents in not how to become a victim is extremely important. Our literature is done in Spanish, Creole and English because of our multicultural community. I also would like to recognize state Sen. Aniteres Flores, R-Miami, who sponsored in the Senate a resolution recognizing our 40th year of service to the community.

Last week I wrote about mailboxes being opened. Here is another email on the subject:

“Dear Carmen, thank you for the information regarding the mailboxes. I have been telling our neighbors not to place mail and lift the ‘red’ flag ever since you did our crime watch meeting years ago. I took your column, made copies and passed it out to my neighbors because we had the same issue a couple of weeks ago. Unfortunately several residents had their bill payments stolen. Who knows where those check are now, probably they were “white washed” and made out to whoever stole the checks. So please continue to warn people to go to the post office and not place their payments in their mailbox. Thanks.” — Connie, Redlands

On another issue, many of you have emailed me regarding “guns on campus” and how irresponsible that would be. Well, I truly agree with all the law enforcement communities and the campus leaders who believe this should not happen. But we all know the gun industry has a big hold on the state of Florida. You need to contact your representatives or call the governor’s office not to sign this bill. I truly feel it will be detrimental to law enforcement and students.

This story was originally published April 13, 2015 at 5:42 PM with the headline "Crime Watch: Website sales safety law heard in Senate committees, stalls in House."