COLONY RIDGE, LIBERTY COUNTY Texas – Something new besides explosive growth is happening in this Texas enclave of some 50,000-75,000, perhaps the largest illegal immigrant settlement in America hundreds of miles inland from the completely overrun southern border:
Policing.
On October 5, Gov. Greg Abbott ordered a significant surge of Texas Department of Public Safety troopers and criminal investigators to fan out over the 60-square-mile unincorporated Colony Ridge 40 miles northeast of Houston for the first significant policing in the colony’s 10 years of nonstop growth.
The verdict after two weeks of saturation state police patrols years after population far-outstripped Liberty County Sheriff Office staffing: They love it, a number of people told me during a Saturday night ride-along with Texas Highway Patrol officers.
“We feel safer, with less wild people,” said Carolina, an entrepreneur selling roasted corn concoctions in a gas station parking lot. Out of gratitude, she had just refused payment by a Texas trooper who was taking a break from backing another trooper on a traffic stop.
“Before [the Texas surge], it was too much noise going on with a lot of gun shots… a lot of bad driving, and we don’t go out from the house to do much stuff around in this neighborhood.”
Because there weren’t enough police, I interjected?
“No, not enough. Not enough,” Carolina said. But now, I asked?
“Right now, we see a lot of cops. We appreciate it. We appreciate it a lot around here.”
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