http://cabbietalk.org

From Mr. Tang today:

“Here is a story “Where to”, and the incident (2/28/09) was posted on the EveryBlock.com

According to the arrest report obtained from the court:

EVENT# 01630 IN SUMMARY, RO’S WERE FLAGGED DOWN BY VICTIM WHO WAS STANDING IN FRONT OF THE LISTED VEHICLE STOPPED AT A RED LIGHT AT CLARK/ADDISON. VICTIM STATED “HE STOLE MY CAB AND BEAT ME UP.” RO’S APPROACHED VEHICLE AND TOLD OFFENDER TO EXIT VEHICLE. OFFENDER OPENED DOOR BUT WOULD NOT EXIT. AO’S TOLD OFFENDER AGAIN TO EXIT VEHICLE. OFFENDER EXITED AND WAS PLACED INTO CUSTODY ON SIGNED COMPLAINTS. OFFENDER TAKEN TO AREA 3 FOR FURTHER INVESTIGATION AND PROCESSING. VICTIM STATED THAT AS HE WAS DROPPING OFF PASSENGERS AT 3000 N. HALSTED (HALSTED/WELLINGTON) WHEN OFFENDER ENTERED BACK SEAT.

OFFENDER TOLD VICTIM “DRIVE.” VICTIM ASKED “WHAT ADDRESS?” OFFENDER STATED AGAIN TO “JUST DRIVE.” VICTIM STATED “I CAN’T TILL YOU GIVE
ME AN ADDRESS.” OFFENDER BEGAN TO USE OBSCENETIES AND CALL VICTIM VULGAR NAMES. AT WHICH TIME VICTIM TOLD OFFENDER TO GET OUT OF HIS CAB. VICTIM STATED THAT HE COULDN’T GET OUT OF CAB BECAUSE THE DOOR WOULDN’T OPEN. VICTIM OPENED THE DOOR FOR OFFENDER AT WHICH TIME OFFENDER BEGAN TO PUNCH VICTIM MULTIPLE TIMES ABOUT THE HEAD AND FACE. VICTIM RUN N/B ON HALSTED TO ESCAPE THE OFFENDER. OFFENDER BEGAN TO CHASE VICTIM AND PUNCH VICTIM AGAIN. VICTIM RAN INTO AN ALLEY AND LOOKED BACK AND OFFENDER WAS NO LONGER CHASING. VICTIM WALKED BACK TO HIS CAB AND OBSERVED OFFENDER ENTER DRIVER SEAT OF CAB AND DRIVE N/B ON HALSTED. VICTIM BEGAN CHASING OFFENDER SHOUTING “STOP” NUMEROUS TIMES. WITNESS WHO IS A FELLOW CABDRIVER OBSERVED VICTIM AND PULL OVER TO HELP. VICTIM ENTERED WITNESS’ CAB AND THEY DROVE AFTER OFFENDER AND CAUGHT UP WITH OFFENDER AT RED LIGHT AT CLARK/ADDISON AND FLAGGED DOWN AO’S. VICTIM’S CAB: YELLOW 1997TX

The court record shows that the Defendant James Burns III (24, White) of Chicago was released on $150,000 D-Bond on March 1 (paid by credit cards) for one count of Vehicular Hijacking, 720 ILCS 5/18-3(a), and he was represented by a Public Defender so far.

Likely, an indictment will be announced at Branch 42 on March 27. The driver Abdul Mohammed (27) reported no injury.

Yi”

“If you need some general ideas of crimes related to taxi, please check out EveryBlock, You may sort either sort by crime type or place.The incidents listed on the EveryBlock are from the CPD directly. Now, the arrest rate is very low, and most incidents are considered to be “minor” ones. Normally, you can verify an arrest from the CPD’s site. If an arrest was made, I would get an arrest report from the court (within the public demine) for details. There is usually 7-10 days delay from here. Many cities have started similar programs.  Only problem is that the quality of the NIBRS is not persistent,” said Yi Tang, Chicago Professional Taxicab Drivers’ Association (CPTDA).

At the request of Barb Kabrick we are posting her comment regarding our project: 

“Kara, 

Just last night a taxi driver in Norfolk, Virginia called me to report that he was robbed at gunpoint.  He was hoping I would be able to somehow alert the local and surrounding cab companies of the incident so that they could be alert in the area.  If your plan covers such, I think it is a terrific idea and I am willing to assist you in any way possible.  

Anything that will help expose the dangers cab drivers face and/or help make the job safer has my full support.  The problem of crimes against taxi drivers will not be adequately addressed as long as the extent of the problem remains unknown.  OSHA made a feeble attempt to address the dangers of cabdriving back in 2001 when they developed their “fact sheet” for the taxi industry.  I say “feeble” because they greatly underestimated the number of assaults against cab drivers and they excluded the vast majority of cabdrivers from it’s coverage because they are not called “employees”.

 OSHA’s paper prompted me to do a survey about violence against cadrivers by interviewing cab drivers themselves across the country.  OSHA had gathered their information from police reports and cab companies, never taking into account the fact that most assaults against cab drivers go unreported.  My survey revealed that about 75%  of the assaults are not reported to the police or the company.  And I’m talking about actual physical assaults.  I found when I attended the Tri-National Conference on Violence as a Workplace Risk, as a U.S. delegate representing the taxi industry, that other industries and professions count verbal abuse as an assault, so that would skew the results even more!  

 In 2004, I was a speaker and panelist at NIOSH’s Workplace Violence Conference, again emphasizing the dangers to cabdrivers and the lack of a reporting system.  I’m not aware of any real attempts to change or improve working conditions for cab drivers as a result of either conference.  Your plan for a reporting system is a great start!   

 Please let me know if there is anything I can do to help.  

 Barb Kabrick

International Taxi Drivers Safety Council”

A speech Barb delivered at NIOSH Workplace Violence Conference

Last night I took a cab in San Francisco to a dinner. I as usual ended up chatting with the cab driver. I mentioned to him about CabbieTalk and what we were thinking of doing. I primarily wanted to get his feedback about the concept and if he would be willing to contribute to such a site.

He kind of caught me by surprise when he told me about one of his fellow cab drivers, which has written a book about his experiences as a driver and also raps about it. We are planning on meeting up with him to get his advice, feedback, and also to hopefully get him to contribute to CabbieTalk.

What keeps coming up now as we research and continue getting more feedback from cabbies is the amount of violence cabbies deal with. K. Weiszhaar from The Taxi News brought this up in his post regarding our project:

“What is the overall goal of this project? What piques your interest in taxi drivers and/or the taxi industry. I used to try to keep track of taxi homicides in Latin America. I just didn’t have the time. Right now I have 2198 alerts in my alert  box. That’s just since July 2008. Probably about 10% of those are homicides. There is no city in the English speaking world that compares to the violence against taxi drivers in countries such as Venezuela, El  Salvador, Guatemala, and Mexico. Caracas, Venezuela and it’s suburbs have to be the most dangerous place on Earth to drive a taxicab.”

The topic of poverty comes up in these countres:

“I think that extreme poverty plus a  breakdown in social order along with corrupt political officials have more  to do with crime against taxi drivers in those Central and South American countries than the climate. If your theory is true, why is the driver homicide rate so much higher in Caracas than Mumbai? Why is the crime rate in Gary, Indiana higher that Ft. Worth, Texas? I’ll bet that the rate of  Spanish speaking people in Ft. Worth exceeds the rate of Spanish speaking people in Gary.”

One of the first people to respond to my post regarding this project to the Yahoo taxi group was
Yi Tang. Mr. Tang is the director of the Chicago Professional Taxicab Drivers’ Association (CPTDA), is originally from China, and has been a Chicago cabbie for twenty years. He didn’t just e-mail me back, he called, left a message and wanted to schedule a time to actually talk! When I called him back a few hours later, we spoke for about 45 minutes about his thoughts and some of the challenges with this project. What he really liked about the project is that it’s a “creating a community that is based on first hand information.” 

The rest of this post are notes taken during our phone conversation:

The Challenges

• The difficult part is to get drivers involved, it’s not like a police officer or teacher’s union. We are independent, from all parts of the world and don’t think of ourselves as one unit.
• The occupation doesn’t have a standard, but is heavily regulated. For example in Chicago the city is trying to ban the use of cellphones by cab drivers. San Francisco is in the lead of regulation. Every city is different, for example SF has created a taxi commission and they have a monthly publication on the airline industry.

The Need This Project Addresses:

• Local Data Creation: Taxi drivers can not create very local crime data based on witness accounts or reporting what happens to them. This is vital for creating policy changes to increase the safety of cab drivers. Also, it provides accessible and timely crime data to drivers about what areas are safe or unsafe for working. According to Yang, the cabbies are the last people to hear about crimes on other cabbies. They need the information to be able to be safe and to navigate the justice system and to reduce the number of crimes. A lot of incidents can be avoided and can minimize the level of injury. “Accidents happen, everyone will die sooner or later, but you want to avoid certain accidents if you can.”

• Creates Understanding of the Taxi Industry and Its Risks: Many people don’t understand how many times cabbies are robbed, held at gunpoint, and murdered and this tool would help people to understand the risks. “What kind of a risk does a cab go through compared to a teacher or police officer? It’s pretty  high! We need to give people a clear picture of the crimes that cab drivers deal with.”
• People Will Listen to Cabbies More:  “Whatever you hear from a cab driver is a noise and people don’t listen to what we’re dealing for.”

Ideally this project would:

• Have a cab driver be able to report a crime committed on them or that they witness to an online database. 

• Get some cab drivers who are willing to try this out.
• Provide an incentive for them to post.
• Make it easy for them to post.
• Provide some utility or some service that helps them be safer.

Text A Taxi As An Incentive for Posting Also Has Challenges:

• Most cabs have a digital dispatch system cruising around the street. “As an individual cab driver I am all over the place. A dispatcher has a GPS zoning system that goes on a first come, first serve basis otherwise it goes to a limousine service and I’m not going across town when someone texts me.”
• You have to get the agencies to work with each other so that perhaps the texts will go through dispatch centers.

Resources

Mr. Tang recommended a few places for us to get some public money for safety research for policymakers to understand the taxi industry:

• National Institute for Occupational Safety – looking at violence with cabbies
• Tang works with the International Association of Crime Analysts. They want to generate the data to create a crime patten.

Studies to Read

• NIOSH and IATR, and you may find more valuable information to follow up.
• Dr. Cammie Chaumont Menndez is the lead researcher, and she has a web blog too under the topic of occupational violence. 
• CDC study on Taxi Violence 

Since posting our CabbieTalk idea as part of the UC Berkeley Human Rights Center Mobile Challenge we have gotten some great ideas from various folks on different online Taxi groups and inquisitive conversations with cabbies in the SF Bay Area. We’ll be filing those here as we develop the project. But first, CabbieTalk you ask?

Here is an excerpt from the proposal which by the way we need you to VOTE ON so that we can get initial funding. So go here and place your vote! Any thoughts and comments would be greatly appreciated!

Around the world news is constantly happening: a picture, a video, a short text message captured by someone. These captured, random experiences in unison are the indicators of events that have impact. It is a conversation happening in communities that anyone can  join – anyone with a cellphone – can be one voice heard by many. An essential part of media is to connect the web to the world, to deliver a message that is timely, relevant and has impact. That process must now be accessible and not limited to a few. Often the communities whose stories need to be told are the least connected to the enabling tools.

Our project will implement a citizen news center based on taxi dispatches made by taxi drivers in two cities, Oakland, California and Guatemala City, Guatemala – both increasingly violent cities where taxi drivers are often attacked or serve as the eyes and ears of the community and immediate events that impact the community. Our project will setup a platform much like http://www.thetaxinews.com/ that will make it easy for drivers to post newsworthy content quickly using cellphones. This will become a backbone for a citizen news hub to influence coverage by a few to many.

Cab drivers are the life lines of a community in that they take passengers to and from their homes and in the process are often witnesses to events that often go unreported. In addition, the penetration of cellphones amongst cab drivers while affording them immediate access to their customers also makes it easy for them to file things using voice reporting. They are perfect members of a news dispatch service, playing a vital role in crime reporting , news alerts and tips and events.

We will provide cab drivers with free cellphones in exchange for each driver registering with our Web site and file reports every day on what they see and experience. To make the service as simple as possible we propose using a voice podcasting model where the cab drivers will be able to call in their reports daily. We can push put their updates via Twitter or an SMS gateway and when people reply we can push back those comments via sms to their cells. The other incentive to this project is that customers can also register with our platform and also use the service to text a taxi for pick-up, thus providing the cab drivers with more business.