With June Best To Remember ‘This Too Shall Pass’

It happens every year. Summer arrives and we begin wondering whether Ocean City is a safe place to be or not.

When it comes to June and all the crime that surfaces during this month, it’s difficult not to conclude that Ocean City can be a dangerous place. However, that would not be an accurate representation of this resort.

Sure there are hundreds of arrests made and some are disturbing. It’s normal to be worried when within a few days there are several reports of routine traffic stops leading to serious weapons and drugs. It’s bothersome to know that people are driving, and walking in some cases, possessing loaded guns in Ocean City. It’s horrifying to read of the deaths and injuries that piled up on Coastal Highway this month.

It’s disturbing to know drug dealers converge on the resort in the summer to move their products. It’s even more bothersome to know when they come here they are often bringing with them guns and knives for so-called protection and intimidation. It’s not comforting to know that wanted individuals often seek out Ocean City as a hiding place during the summer months. It’s unsettling to know that police recently made several arrests during an undercover operation on the Boardwalk that revealed people openly trying to sell drugs during late-night hours.

All of these situations inevitably raise questions about the type of people coming to Ocean City and whether this is a serious issue in need of more attention than it gets or just a sign of June at this beach town.

We feel it’s simply indicative of what happens here each June. Inevitably, and it’s already starting to happen now, the younger crowd that comes to Ocean City with an intent on partying as hard as possible starts to go home and in their place comes the families the resort so desperately tries to appeal to throughout the year.

There is no mistaking that June is a chaotic and concerning time in Ocean City. Is it dangerous? Yes, it is at certain times and in specific locales. However, that does not mean we all need lock up our kids and ban them from hanging out in Ocean City. We just need to educate them on what June is like in Ocean City and remind them Ocean City becomes a metropolitan area in the summer months and with that comes those sorts of problems.

Ocean City is a safe and clean beach resort. Unfortunately, every June, it becomes an enormous playground for teenagers and college students in their early-20s who are simply interested in playing hard without any respect to others and that involves drinking and drugging. People who enjoy this sort of scene understand this goes on in large numbers at the beach in June, and that’s why a questionable element often surfaces around town during these weeks. That’s why the police beat is often full of concerning incidents this time of year.

With July comes even larger crowds than June, but it’s a different sort of vacationer. In large part, it’s families who have saved up all year to visit here and all they want to do is make memories at the beach. That’s why the criminal element falls dramatically and the disturbing arrests slow down significantly. It happens every summer.

Ocean City is a destination vacation and with that comes some unfortunate aspects, but rest assured when the calendar flips to July everything will start to settle down on the crime front. We just have to take the good with the bad, but the good is now going to take the spotlight.