Neighborhood Watch

In essence, Neighborhood Watch is a crime prevention program that stresses education and common sense. It teaches citizens how to help themselves by identifying and reporting suspicious activity in their neighborhoods. In addition, it provides citizens with the opportunity to make their neighborhoods safer and improve the quality of life. Neighborhood Watch groups typically focus on observation and awareness as a means of preventing crime and employ strategies that range from simply promoting social interaction and "watching out for each other" to active patrols by groups of citizens.

Nevertheless, the key to the improvement of the quality of life and perception of crime in these neighborhoods is the officer’s ability to listen to neighbors, working with them to creatively address issues. ROPE is the neighborhood’s liaison with government resources, including the police, providing an immediate link to community policing efforts throughout the City Of Elgin. The identification of neighborhood issues, followed by a coordination of effort lead by the police with City departments, is the key to ROPE success. Each neighborhood poses issues requiring unique solutions. ROPE, in concert with an enhanced department philosophy of community policing, offers an opportunity to benefit neighborhoods across the City of Elgin. Also, the ability to identify a problem and find its solution is one aspect of ROPE that provides both challenges and rewards to the officer and neighbors. The personal contact with the neighborhood is an immeasurable benefit of the program. The program provides a constant challenge to solve problems while living and working in the neighborhood that a resident officer must realize. Scheduling must be flexible, contrary to traditional policing, to allow officers the ability to address quality

“Community policing is, in essence, a collaboration between the police and the community that identifies and solves community problems” (U.S. Department of Justice, 1994, p. vii). Throughout the years, community policing has become a more popular strategy to help law enforcement officials control and deter crime; however, some areas across the United States has had problems in the past with communities and law enforcement working together to ensure a secure and safe environment. Although it is an officer’s duty to maintain order, keep the peace, and solve problems within the area he or she

Ted Nugent said people looking out for suspicious behavior are “The purest form of Americans watching out for each other and being good neighbors” (Cover). I agree that people watching the neighborhood is a good thing because they are making sure it is safe for themselves and their children. If someone sees something suspicious they can tell another person so they can call the police while the other person tries to alleviate the problem before it blows out of proportion. If you see someone breaking into another person house, you could call them or the police to notify them showing you are a good

Many communities have started a neighborhood watch program and have seen tremendous results. The mayor of the city of Annapolis, Maryland highly recommends it. He reports having seen a tremendous improvement in safety citywide. Any sort of program even remotely related to the neighborhood watch program will be an improvement. Some may argue that no one will take this seriously, there are numerous success stories that tell otherwise. They tell of a hard working community working for the greater good. That community can be Alpena. With a little hard work, we too can be almost crime

Community policing is has two main components the police and the community that identifies and solves community problems. Community participants speak their concerns, contribute advice, and take action to address these concerns. By creating a positive partnership we will need the energy, creativity, understanding, and patience of all involved. Certain communities take longer time than others to break down walls of apathy and mistrust so that important partnerships can be formed. Community policing officers are able to pursue numerous paths toward achieving self-regulated and self-defended neighborhoods. They have the chance of working jointly and equally with citizens. This helps to define local problems, educating the community about the causes of crime and

The neighborhood is recommending that there be more bike controls out during the day, more police units on patrol during the late-night hours and setting up community safety workshops. We believe that having additional police presence in our neighborhood, will cut down on the crime rate.

Prior to the 1970’s, law enforcement agencies were completely unaware of how effective their methods of policing and patrolling truly were, if they were even effective at all. After questioning the efficiency of their methods for so long, the Kansas City Police Department decided to conduct an experiment on preventative patrol. This experiment focused on four main questions-- would the public notice, would visible police affect crime, would the citizens’ fear of crime diminish, and would police satisfaction change. Although preventative patrol has the aspects of a powerful policing method, this landmark experiment may have produced some interesting and thought provoking results on the topic.

Community policing techniques may vary from suburban communities and inner cities because of the demographics of the regions. Community policing in suburban communities can certainly contribute to a greater decrease in crime because of the close quarters police officers have with the members of the community. Community policing is designed as a proactive approach in reducing crime in the community. A collaborative relationship between law enforcement and individuals only strengthens the trust with the police. Indeed this relationship is embedded in suburban areas because policer officers are constantly personalizing their response calls. In addition, Law enforcement agencies in suburban community may rely on more financial base resources in contributing to the infrastructure of neighborhoods. For example, policies are implemented in renovating after school programs for the better of the community. Many police officers

In a like manner, elevated violent crime rates are a rectifiable issue of Palm Coast. With the formation of neighborhood watch groups and advertisement of their activity, the number of violent crimes should significantly decrease based on a study by the U.S Justice Department. Whether it is the deterrent of the sign or the thought that there are easier targets crime decreased when these groups were in place and I thus may be helpful in lowering the violent crime rate of my

In low income, run down communities the task of working with the community members is more challenging because most are fearful and have lost faith in their communities and local police. These are the communities that need community policing the most, so that generationally gangs, drug and violence do not continue to rule the neighborhoods. Collaboratively, parents and youth need to work with police so that they do not become at risk for falling into criminal activity, instead fight to make the communities they live in safer.

The most promising activities that I found to be most beneficial to our community would be to establish a foot patrol program and police-school liaison programs. The foot patrol program has been implemented in several states and proven to be success. This will help our officers get to know the residents that they serve and begin to build a trust between the two. In Flint, Michigan the program showed to reduce fear of crime and create an optimistic awareness about the neighborhood and the officers patrolling (Miller, Hess, & Orthmann, 2014). While this can create a positive influence on the residents of the community and help reduce crime in neighborhoods, there could be an influx of crime with commercial properties like in Boston, Massachusetts

They also, of course, respond to dispatch calls of crimes in progress. Crime prevention is achieved through mere police presence. Negative interaction between the community and police is generally the norm. In communities policing, on the other hand, police officers are typically assigned to specific geographic areas in their jurisdiction and establish ties with the various community groups. These groups may include ministerial (church) associations, neighborhood associations, youth groups, etc. The idea is that when police are involved with the community they are not viewed as outsiders who are there simply to enforce the law. Crime prevention is achieved through positive interaction with police and the community. The goals of community policing are to reduce crime and disorder, promote citizens’ quality of life in communities, reduce fear of crime, and improve police–citizen relations. These goals are achieved through three essential efforts: community engagement, problem solving, and organizational transformation. In other words, the police are the public and the public are the police.

operate with the police. The community relies on the police department to keep their city safe,

The philosophy of Robert Peel that “the police are the public and the public are the police”, is one that perfectly sums up the relationship between the police and the rest of the community (Lentz & Chaires 2007). This quote suggests that law enforcement needs approval from citizens and residents of neighbourhoods to perform their duties correctly. Meaning, this requires the police to maintain an informed relationship with the community. By doing so they are reducing the reoccurrence of the themes in crime prevention mentioned above.