Citizen’s Patrol
Tuesday, October 16th, 2007Be sure to click on highlighted titles below!
In 1989 when I was sworn in as Sheriff, we had two community crime watch organizations, Bella Vista and Lost Bridge Village. Crime Watch was an organization for residents who lived in a specific area to watch out for one another. Members of this organization would drive around looking for anything that was suspicious. The crime watchers had a good but archaic system of communications in place. This was the way it worked.
When members were out on patrol and saw something suspicious, the crime watch member would use a two way radio, to radio a base operator. The base operator would then call the Sheriff’s Office, who would radio a Deputy. Information passed through several channels before it got to the field Deputy. Many times the information was incorrect because of all the channels it went through. This Crime Watch system required at least two people working at all times; a person out on patrol and a person to receive radio calls. The base operator had to have a radio and a phone available to call the Sheriff’s Office, all at their expense.
Our administration recognized there was a more effective way to communicate with the crime watch members who were on patrol and at the same time, eliminate the person manning the civilian base radio. Our solution was to loan each crime watch organization a hand held police radio. This would allow the crime watch member on patrol to speak directly to the field Deputy. What a difference this made!
The first week of using our radios, a member of the Lost Bridge Village Crime Watch witnessed some burglars at work. He radioed our dispatch and spoke directly to the field Deputy. The field Deputy was some distance away, but we also put our radio system in the local State Police units and as luck would have it a State Trooper was within reasonable distance. The Trooper asked to intervene, did so, and was able to locate the burglars and make the arrest. All thanks to the crime watch member and the police radio we issued them. Before I retired we had well over twenty crime watch organizations in Benton County all using our police radios. The system we put in place worked well.
But, we need to take the crime watch watch patrol a step further. We will introduce another civilian crime fighting tool. This will be a Sheriff’s patrol car with side door markings that will read “Citizens Patrol”. A Sheriff’s vehicle that clearly shows this is a civilian on patrol. Instead of just issuing a radio, we will issue a patrol car with a radio and the standard police equipment. No longer will our “Citizen Patrol” use their private cars, pay for gas, or cover the cost of insurance when on watch patrol. This will be covered by their county tax dollars. We will have signs placed on all streets leading into any participating community that read “NEIGHBORHOOD CRIME WATCH by CITIZENS ON PATROL”
In addition to placing patrol units into neighborhoods, the Sheriff’s Office will seek funding to send active Neighborhood Crime Watch members to the National Association Citizens on Patrol annual conference. A lot can be learned by attending these conferences through sharing experiences and ideas. Together we will stop crime from entering our neighborhood, community and county.
