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A circle of mothers awaited school buses to drop off their children, trying to forget the spot a few feet away where a young man was gunned down the night before.
The mothers were afraid to talk about the growing violence in the east Charlotte neighborhood where Milton Road and Barrington Drive intersect.
"You see nothing, don't know nothing," said one, who declined to give her name. "You just leave it behind."
Crime may have fallen dramatically this year citywide. But this neighborhood - already infamous for the 2007 shooting deaths of two police officers at Timber Ridge apartments - has lately seen a surge of violence.
The several-block area is anchored by four apartment complexes, replete with subsidized housing and families living below the poverty line. Local residents say it's part of the Hope Valley neighborhood.
In response to recent violence, uptown's First Baptist Church held a prayer service in one of the apartment complexes. In 2007 the church started weekly Bible study groups in the neighborhood.
And in this city election, violence in and around Milton Road and the role public housing plays in crime are issues.
Some blame poverty and increasing unemployment. Some blame a concentration of public housing, which in general draws more police calls and incidents of crime, Observer analyses have shown.
Charlotte-Mecklenburg police say a new gang is committing crimes in the area as it tries to create a street reputation. And three homicides this summer again have cast the community in a violent light.
Adding to the pall, police said a 20-year-old girl standing outside and watching police investigate the late-night homicide Aug. 26 was bitten by fire ants and died on the spot from an allergic reaction.
"There's a lot of bad luck," said CMPD Sgt. James Elliott, who's responsible for that section of the North Tryon Division. "We've got no businesses there, just a few mom-and-pop stores. There's high unemployment. You got a lot of folks with little to do, especially the 13- to 20-year-olds."
Police and others say the vast majority of people here are law-abiding and peaceful. But CMPD reported violent crime through Sept. 20 was up 50 percent over the same time last year, , according to department statistics.
Stand at the corner of Milton and Barrington and you're within a quarter-mile of the sites of 24 violent crimes this year. That compares with 16 during the same period last year. Non-aggravated assaults are also up more than 40 percent.
Three homicides in the area in two months have rattled residents.
•On Aug. 26, William Norman, 20, was shot and killed in a parking lot on Lanecrest Drive near Hampton Commons apartments in what police say was a botched drug-related robbery.
•On Aug. 2, Ja'Ron McGill, 19, was gunned down near the corner of Lanecrest Drive and Colby Place near Hampton Commons as he walked from his girlfriend's home. The crime has stumped police, who have found no apparent motive or suspects.
•On July 10, Yumeka Caldwell, 21 and nine months pregnant, was shot and killed inside her Timber Ridge apartment. The unborn child's father, Antonio Phifer, killed her and then himself, police said. The baby didn't survive.
Caldwell's killing was especially tragic because police had just left her apartment, chasing a car they thought Phifer was in. Back at Caldwell's apartment, he kicked open the door and killed her.
Many challenges
Besides its rising crime, this neighborhood is known for its blue-collar and service workers and modest incomes. Its median household income is $30,230, compared with $55,800 for Mecklenburg as a whole.
More than half of its families with children are headed by a single parent. More than 40percent of its families with children live in poverty.
Most residents are renters, and this is a part of town where government-subsidized housing is concentrated.
James McGill, father of homicide victim Ja'Ron, lives against that grain. He and his wife own their home just a few blocks from where his son was killed.
At a recent church service for Ja'Ron, McGill wept and hugged family as pastor Donnie Garris preached nonviolence and for neighbors to watch out for one another.
McGill shook his head after the service as he ticked off the list of recent violent crimes in his neighborhood. He said the community used to have more homeowners and residents with roots.
"It's sad to say, but now everyone has shut themselves in," he said. "I heard an old person say... (that in the past) if mama wasn't watching you, someone else's was. That was neighborhood watch. It wasn't the police. It was grandma; it was big mama."
McGill said his son Ja'Ron never got in trouble with police. He was about to become a father and had a steady job. He played drums in the church band and ran track for the Charlotte Panthers team.
"It's time for the churches in that area to get more involved and for city officials to stop being quiet," James McGill said.
Public housing
Some east Charlotte residents blame the clustering of public housing for creating knots of poverty with higher crime and lowered property values.
Observer research has shown police calls are more prevalent in housing complexes with higher percentages of subsidized units.
In complaining about clusters, advocates for the poor cite research that says sprinkling affordable housing more evenly through the county would lower overall crime.
Subsidized housing in the Milton-Barrington area comes largely in the form of Section8 rental assistance vouchers, which are federally funded and can be used anywhere in the county that landlords accept them. Some recipients say the vouchers only reasonably cover rents in poorer parts of town.
An Observer study from 2006 showed roughly four of every five Section 8 residents were clustered in 10 ZIP codes already burdened with crime.. At the same time, affluent communities, including vast stretches of south Charlotte and areas near Lake Norman, had virtually none of the tenants.
The Charlotte Housing Authority, which administers the program, says it's powerless to direct where the vouchers are used.
A campaign issue
Public housing's effect on crime rates and property values has become a campaign issue this year.
At a recent candidates' forum at an east Charlotte school, residents complained their part of town has more than its share.
Mayoral candidates Anthony Foxx, a Democrat, and Republican John Lassiter, have rejected plans that would change zoning laws to require developers to include affordable housing in each new project.
Some other N.C. cities, such as Durham, have the requirements, called inclusionary zoning.
The candidates, however, each support approving financial incentives for developers to piggy-back extra housing units onto new developments.
"I know Section 8 is not supposed to allow someone to afford a mansion, but the market problem is that those vouchers tend to get used in the same places," said Foxx.
Lassiter said he believes communities with clustered public housing can end up as "havens" for criminals. He said there aren't enough "supporting resources to help people find jobs and complete their high school education."
'Someone's children'
As the school buses arrived at Hampton Commons, the day after the latest homicide, small children, some wearing khaki shorts and neat polo shirts, lugged book bags that seemed as big as their bodies.
The mothers and other family members held the children's hands as they walked toward front doors of the various buildings of the apartment complex with its mown front lawns and rows of nondescript beige doors. Some high school kids lingered in the street and talked.
Life moved forward peacefully, like most afternoons.
One mother said she liked living in the neighborhood. And she reminded in a stern tone that the perpetrators and the victims "are all someone's children."
Twenty-seven-year-old Tiffany Gibbs walked with her 7-year-old daughter and younger sister from the school bus.
Gibbs admits to "some bad decisions" and has a police record. She ended up on the Section 8 public rental assistance in a two-bedroom Hampton Commons apartment.
She'd like to leave. She earned her high school diploma through a CPCC program, and wants to go back to school. But she has two children and little work.
Her Section 8 voucher offers about $640 a month for rent. But it must be used for a two-bedroom apartment, and Hampton Commons is one of the few places available in the price range, she said. She and her children stay inside at night.
"I don't like this neighborhood. There's always something going on here," she said. "Every time you turn around, you see guys standing on the corner. That's just trouble."
Observer reporter Ely Portillo and researcher Marion Paynter contributed.
