Neighborhood Watch

What is it?

The Neighborhood Watch Program is a highly successful effort that has been in existence for more than thirty years in cities and counties across America. Neighborhood Watch is a crime prevention program that enlists the active participation of residents in cooperation with law enforcement to reduce crime in their neighborhoods.

Around the country, neighbors for three decades have banded together to create Neighborhood Watch programs. They understand that the active participation of neighborhood residents is a critical element in community safety not through vigilantism, but simply through a willingness to look out for suspicious activity in their neighborhood, and report that activity to law enforcement and to each other. In doing so residents take a major step toward reclaiming high-crime neighborhoods, as well as making people throughout their community feel more secure and less fearful.

It involves:

  • Neighbors getting to know each other and working together in a program of mutual assistance.
  • Residents trained to recognize and report suspicious activities in their neighborhoods
  • Implementation of crime prevention techniques such as home security, Operation Identification etc.

Getting Organized

When a group decides to form a Neighborhood Watch, it:

  • Contacts the police department or local crime prevention organization for help in training members in home security and reporting skills and for information on local crime patterns
  • Selects a coordinator and block captains who are responsible for organizing meetings and relaying information to members
  • Recruits members, keeps up-to-date on new residents and makes special efforts to involve the elderly, working parents, and young people
  • Works with local government and law enforcement to put up Neighborhood Watch signs, usually after at least 50 percent of all households in a neighborhood are enrolled

What Neighborhood Watch Members Look For

  • Someone screaming or shouting for help
  • Someone looking into windows and parked cars
  • Unusual noises
  • Property being taken out of houses where no one is at home or a business is closed
  • Cars, vans, or trucks moving slowly with no apparent destination, or without lights
  • Anyone being forced into a vehicle
  • A stranger sitting in a car or stopping to talk to a child
  • Abandoned cars.

Report these incidents to the police department. Talk about the problem with your neighbors.

How To Report Crimes/Suspicious activities

  • Giving your name and address are helpful but you can be anonymous.
  • Briefly describe the event - what happened, when, where, and who was involved.
  • Describe the suspect: sex and race, age, height, weight, hair color, clothing, distinctive characteristics such as beard, mustache, scars, tattoos or accent.
  • Describe the vehicle if one was involved: color, make, model, year, license plate, and special features such as stickers, dents, or decals.

Keeping your Neighborhood Watch Group Active

It's an unfortunate fact that when a neighborhood crime crisis goes away, so does enthusiasm for Neighborhood Watch. Work to keep your Watch group a vital force for community well being.

•  National Night Out is a National Crime Prevention/Awareness celebration, which falls on the first Tuesday of August every year. This is a good time to keep your neighborhood involved and have fun together while enjoying special visitors from the Police Department, City officials and local business mascots.

  • Organize regular meetings that focus on current issues such as drug abuse, "hate" or bias-motivated violence, crime in schools, child care before and after school, recreational activities for young people, and victim services.
  • Organize community patrols to walk around streets or apartment complexes and alert police to crime and suspicious activities and identify problems needing attention. People in cars with cellular phones or CB radios can patrol.
  • Adopt a park or school playground. Pick up litter, repair broken equipment, paint over graffiti.
  • Publish a newsletter that gives prevention tips and local crime news, recognizes residents of all ages who have "made a difference," and highlights community events.
  • Don't forget social events that give neighbors a chance to know each other - a block party, potluck dinner, volleyball or softball game, picnic.

REMEMBER, TOGETHER WE CAN MAKE A DIFFERENCE!

Rosie Fabela Southwest Crime Prevention Officer 572-9676

Modesto Police Crime Prevention Unit

fabelar@modestopd.com