A law-and-order story out of southeast Arkansas, with attention to demographic and economic inputs

The New York Times reported a few days ago from Eudora, Arkansas, in Chico County, in the Mississippi Delta region.  The headline is: "In a Small Arkansas City, Crime, Dread and an Emergency Curfew."  An excerpt from Rick Rojas's story follows:  

[O]n Christmas Eve, a bullet pierced Martene Frazell’s window as she closed her curtains. The holiday feast she had been preparing was still on the stove as Ms. Frazell, a 47-year-old known for being a constant presence at her church, lay bloodied and dying on the floor.

Her killing crystallized the fear and frustration over violence in Eudora, pushing city officials to reach for a drastic measure last week: an emergency curfew restricting the roughly 1,700 residents from being outside their homes after 8 p.m. 

* * * 

The curfew has prompted complaints from residents concerned about losing their ability to move freely. The proprietors of a liquor store and a chicken wing spot — among the few businesses typically open past 8 p.m. — worried about losing money.

But many in Eudora — including those who believe the curfew is urgently necessary — see it as a desperate, stopgap measure that will not undo any of the decline and disinvestment at the root of the community’s struggles.

“I’m tired of the senseless violence — I actually care,” said Sgt. Joe Harden of the Eudora Police Department, which has a full-time staff consisting of him, the chief and another officer who recently graduated from the academy — all of whom have recently been working shifts of 14 hours or longer. “I just want things to change for the better.”

And then there is this important demographic and economic context: 

The blame also rests with something deeper, some residents say. The population of Eudora has dwindled over the years. The streets are dotted with shuttered storefronts, abandoned churches and overgrown properties. The high school closed. Sergeant Harden remembered when Eudora had its own Little League. What remains, residents said, is a void that has allowed discord and crime to fester.

“There’s so much conflict in a little town — unnecessary conflict,” said the Rev. David Green Sr., 62, the pastor of St. Peter Missionary Baptist Church, who was raised in Eudora and also raised his children there.

I can't help think that this regional context is also critical: 

The troubles in Eudora afflict many rural towns across the South, where an absence of opportunity and resources has contributed to violence. Almost 60 miles north, in the small city of Dumas, a community festival in March erupted into gunfire, becoming one of the country’s largest mass shootings in 2022 with one person killed and 26 others wounded.