Prostitution

In tomorrow's St. Pete Times

Prostitutes find they have formidable foes St. Petersburg Times - St. Petersburg,FL,USA... "Driving home late one night, Sherry Simons spotted six prostitutes within a few blocks. Prostitution is back in Seminole Heights. ..."


"By late spring, the prostitutes mostly had disappeared, Simons said. Tampa police Maj. Robert Guidara said prostitution reports in District Two, which includes Southeast Seminole Heights, dropped 72 percent.

So the neighborhood patrols stopped, and the police concentrated their efforts elsewhere."
. . .

"Three weeks ago, Barnhill mustered volunteers for a new vehicle patrol for the Old Seminole Heights portion of Nebraska, between Hillsborough Avenue and the river.

Simons did the same for the Southeast Seminole Heights stretch of Nebraska, south of Hillsborough to Martin Luther King.

The neighborhood watch groups have reopened their well-established channels with Tampa police, which are revisiting the area.

The department's Street Anti-Crime squad made 13 prostitution arrests along Nebraska in the past three weeks, Sgt. Jon Gamson said.

"It's like anything else that requires maintenance," he said. "Right now we're at a heightened level of enforcement to make sure we don't return to the previous levels of activity."