surveillance video<\/a> captured thieves using a pickup truck to rip the security gates off Meta Liquor before stealing thousands of dollars worth of merchandise.<\/p>\nThe store owner told FOX26 at the time that the burglary was the third break in at the business since he bought it in 2021. He also said he had contacted police more than 10 times this year regarding problems near the property.<\/p>\n
The surveillance footage showed that after the security gates and doors were forced open, more people entered the store and took merchandise.<\/p>\n
VIDEO: Truck used to rip off security door in $5,000 Meta Liquor burglary<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
A nearby business owner, who asked not to be identified, previously told FOX26 that crime and homelessness have become ongoing concerns in the area.<\/p>\n
Seeking answers, FOX26 brought those concerns directly to Fresno City Councilmember Tyler Maxwell during a Fresno City Council meeting on Thursday. <\/p>\n
When asked about business owners who say they repeatedly call police and feel hopeless, Maxwell defended the city’s law enforcement efforts.<\/p>\n
Here’s the thing: we got the best police chief and the best police force in the entire state of California, bar none, hands down,<\/p>\n
Maxwell said.<\/p>\n
Maxwell acknowledged officers are facing significant demands throughout the city.<\/p>\n
“They are stretched incredibly thin, going from emergency to emergency to emergency, to the point where even if they would like to spend more time in a certain neighborhood, in a certain community, building relationships, the nature of the job is not allowing for that,” he said.<\/p>\n
After the meeting, FOX26 returned to the Shields and Cedar area and showed Maxwell’s response to people working nearby.<\/p>\n
An employee at Meta Liquor declined to speak on camera.<\/p>\n
However, a nearby business owner said,<\/p>\n
I just wanna see change and see if he’s actually gonna change anything about it,<\/p>\n
she explained.<\/p>\n
The business owner also noted that a homeless encampment FOX26 documented near the businesses in May was no longer present during a recent visit.<\/p>\n
Still, she does not believe the situation has been resolved.<\/p>\n
“Police came a few weeks ago, but they’ll come back,” she said.<\/p>\n
She added that many business owners remain frustrated.<\/p>\n
“There’s nothing we can do. Even if we called the police officer out here, they won’t do nothing,” she said.<\/p>\n
Maxwell told FOX26 the city continues to work on both public safety and homelessness concerns.<\/p>\n
Business owners in the area say they will be watching closely to see whether conditions improve in the months ahead.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"FRESNO, Calif. (FOX26) \u2014 One month after a burglary at a Fresno liquor store drew attention to crime…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":366769,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[31],"tags":[112,114,113],"class_list":["post-366768","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-fresno","tag-fresno","tag-fresno-headlines","tag-fresno-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/366768","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=366768"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/366768\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/366769"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=366768"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=366768"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=366768"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}