Neighborhood Watch

The idea of the neighborhood watch is one which has been proven to be one of the most effective ways to decrease crime within a neighborhood community. The basic idea of the neighborhood watch centers around neighborhood residents paying attention and identifying suspicious happenings and alerting and reporting crimes to police department. Through Neighborhood Watch groups and standardized surveillance techniques, residents and neighbors can assist and help the law enforcement authorities catch kidnappers, rapists, drug dealers, or other suspicious person or groups who pose an immediate threat to the safety of the neighborhood while at the same time residents keep an eye out for each other including property. Studies suggest that the
Neighborhood Watch concept began as a reaction to a upsurge of home break ins that started in the late 60's into the early 70's. Although this idea was first started by citizens, the Neighborhood Watch rose to prominence and quickly became connected with police platforms. In 1972, the National Sheriffs Association officially validated the neighborhood watch as a tool to bring awareness to neighborhood residents in recognizing and reporting crime.
The National Association of Town Watch in the United States approximates that they are at least just about 20,000 organized neighborhood watch groups that exist presently many of who use various watch techniques.
Law enforcement officials believe that the Neighborhood Watch method is most operative in middle class neighborhoods across the United Sates where there is a large amount of residents owing their own homes or residents who have children. Apartment complexes and neighborhoods where they is always a steady influx of tenants moving in and out can have successful neighborhood watches as well but these areas usually demand a little bit more organizing and persistence for it to be fruitfully successful. Still, you can achieve successful neighborhood watches once there is a center core group of residents invested in the cause of the neighborhood watch.
In the more impoverished, low-income neighborhoods, the neighborhood watch concept can also be operative, but these neighborhoods face major challenges like unemployment, poor infrastructure and lots of loitering areas called blocks, along with drug dealers and abusers who can quickly threaten and dwarf the watch
operation. An operative tool for many neighborhood watch group programs is to use a resident or citizen patrol. Its most times generally up to the neighborhood in conjunction with law enforcement officials to decide whether or not a resident patrol is needed. Resident or citizen patrols use helpers or volunteers who walk or drive a designated area on a set time basis to observe and report incidents and any situations that may seem suspicious to law enforcement officials and also provide a visible presence within the set area so that it can criminals will desist or think twice before committing an offence. These resident patrols are in no way police officers or law enforcement officials; they don’t carry weapons, they don’t usually confront suspects and they always work hand in hand with law enforcement or the local authorities. A resident or citizen patrol, as the NCPC reports, can cover any neighborhood, apartment complex, business district, or park. They can also contact law enforcement officials through the use of modern day two-way radios or cellular phones.
Mobile phones seem to be a great device for neighborhood watch groups to use in the event to fight crime. Over a 9 month period the use of mobile phones by several neighborhood watch groups in 11 areas in Florida caused a dramatic reduction in break-ins, robberies, and thefts.
Researchers from Florida International University reported that
• burglaries showed a decrease in 33 %,
• robberies showed a decrease in 24 % and
• thefts showed a decrease in 9 %.
In addition to the above mentioned data, many volunteers reported that the response time to in progress criminal events seem to be more rapidly than it was before the joint venture. In 1996 The Public Safety articlen stated that the venture fostered a tighter relationship with the neighborhoods and police departments involved in this exercise with Metro-Dade police department director Fred Taylor saying that the use of mobiles phones seem to have what he called a displacement effect on the the criminal activity.
One more operative resident patrol was reported in Washington’s North Lincoln Park neighborhood. Collectedly, they were able to band together and walk the streets of Washington, DC in orange hats. Their neighborhood watch group started about ten years ago and presently boasts over 20 orange hat watch groups. Not only do they do neighborhood look outs but they are also actively involved in community service with membership from both black and white races. One of their popular tactics involve picking up litter and making noted of car license plates for vehicles suspected to be involved in drug dealing among other sort of illegal activity. In 1994 the American Survey reported that the orange hat neighborhood watch group of group of Washington do seem to be recognized and appreciated by the residents of the area because of their active effort to keep vagrants, drug dealers and drunkards out of the area which led to a 7% decrease in overall street crime from about a year ago. Additionally they are several other methods neighborhoods can use to help stop crime effectively and this can be accomplished through environmental design. This may sound strange but yes, crime prevention through environmental design is centered and focused on how to design and or redesign the built design of an environmental space to make it less condusive to criminal activity. Practitioners of this type of design abbreviated as CPTED, as noted by Brennan and Zelinka uses three general principles:
• one being natural surveillance where in you are placing physical features, activities, and people to maximize visibility;
• another being natural access control where in everything is structured through the judicial placement of entrances, exits, fencing, landscaping, and lighting; and
• territorial reinforcement where in you are using buildings, fences, pavement, signs, and landscaping to express ownership.
A perfect example of a CPTED can be seen in the state of in Arizona.
In Phoenix's Isaac neighborhood which is located just off the Interstate highway interchange, criminals have been using that area located there for years a 60 acre stretch where burgularies, drug selling and rampant prostitution has been active for sevaeral years, so in 1995 the state of Arizona, Phoenix city department and Issac’s Neighborhood Action Committee started drafting up ways to help lower the crime rate and illegal activities. Support for this new project came from and was backed by the planning department, neighborhood services department and the street transportation department, With the help of local neigbourhood residents providing the needed expertise and relevant input, the neighborhood watch group devised a h a strategy for making the neighborhood safer by completely closing down one street and turning the other open stret into a one way street and ensuring that the damage edifices were removed. Since the C.P.T.E.D changes were made the neighborhood residents reported that the crime level in the neighborhood had greatly decreased (Brennan & Zelinka,
1997).
Neighborhoods can always avert crime situations in their neighborhoods and in order for them to have a successful and effective neighborhood watch program, they should ensure that they is an organized management team that have the nessasary contacts to the local law enforcement authorities. When starting up a watch group it is important that there should be some sort of symbol or color that would be able to have them distinguish themselves from everyone else, like the orange-hat watch group in Washington D. C., this will most times let crimals know that the watch is actively watching and alert to step in at anytime once anything suspicious is observed.
It has been observed and proven that watch groups using mobile devices lower crime rates significantly, since the use of these devices ensure that you can contact the authorities and report activity immediately. Also watch groups who are interested in using mobile phones strickly for this purpose should make contact with a local mobile phone service provider to inquiry about donation information or special deals/rates they might be willing to offer the group. C.P.T.D is just another option for neighborhoods to help reduce and curb criminal activity. Assistance through local government agencies along with suggestions and recommendation from residents can help reduce crime in the designated neigbourhood by using the core principles such as activity support, good property management and maintainace.
Generally, a neighborhood watch group or program can be a positive and great option for any and every neighborhood that is plagued by high criminal activity. It for one helps to bring together the local residents while helping them all fight against that one common issue or problem they have in common which is a high crime rate. If the neighborhood watch group is successfully implemented and carried out then there is really no reason for persons to migrate to gated communities which is the next big move among middle class families within the United States. Until our society can begin to work together and make the nessesary changes to help fight crime together then more and more gated neighborhoods will continue to appear leaving the neighborhood watch programs with no more neighborhoods to protect and watch.
The pressing question remains though… Do gated communities really keep crime rates down or is is just a social status move for families who can afford the high price luxuries of living in a gated box? The answer to me may be yes but only but a small percentage.
Many residents and home owners believe that the home owners and residents of gated communities are living with a sense of false security. Ed Cross a Real Estate Broker said its really just a marketing gimic, a modern day fad. The security gate codes are given to so many people like family members, friends, pizza delivery boys who have frequent and regular access to these communities that it would be impossible to to track down who did what id any crime was evr commited , also many people question how far will a security officer to ensure that the laws of the community is enforced since it’s a private property. Also there is the issue of emergency personnel being able to again access to these gated communities since they don’t have the codes so if there is an emergency they will most likely be locked outside for hours. But no matter the cons these gated communities are gaining popularity every year and people are deserting their old neighborhood for a new start behind gates and walls because it offeres them a sense of better security. The traditional neighborhood watches are being diminished for these newer, getaways. However, neighborhood watch programs has bee around for years and they have been proven to reduce crime significantly if ran by the community. It can be just as safe as living behind gated communities.