Chester violence clouds soccer stadium's opener

Just as Chester prepares to bask in the national spotlight, the city finds itself fighting the imposing shadow of a stubborn image further intensified by a recent rash of violence.

On the weekend before the Philadelphia Union is to play its first game at its brand-new soccer stadium in the city's West End - the centerpiece of a hoped-for $500 million riverfront revival - Mayor Wendell N. Butler Jr. on Saturday declared a state of emergency after four shooting deaths in an eight-day period.

While some residents and business owners interviewed supported the mayor's action, which include beefed-up police patrols and 9 p.m. curfews in high-crime areas, others questioned why it took a soccer game to kick-start the city's response to what they viewed as a long-standing crime crisis.

"We've been in a state of emergency for the past four, five years," said Rep. Thaddeus Kirkland (D., Delaware), who lives three blocks from where a 2-year-old boy was shot and killed on June 13.

Kirkland underlines his point by driving a Dodge Durango with a bullet hole in its front - his personal reminder of the dangers of living in Chester.

"There is a state of emergency now because there is a soccer stadium opening up on Sunday, and we want to make sure the people coming in here feel safe," said Kirkland, a nine-term legislator. "And I understand that. But we've been trying to feel safe around here for a long time."

Tina Johnson said officials were overreacting. "It can't be lost on anyone that the stadium will open in a week," said Johnson, president of Chester Community Grocery Co-op. "We've had other murders when we didn't know when they were going to stop."

For Butler's part, he said he had assumed the violence would abate after the death of 2-year-old Terrence Webster. When it didn't, "I just felt I had to move to action," the mayor said.

"Unfortunately, we've had murders in our town even when I came on the police force back in the 1960s," Butler said.

This year, 11 homicides have occurred in the city, police said, compared with seven in the same period last year. This year's total does not appear extreme. Based on available statistics, the city has averaged about 20 homicides annually since 2004.