PAC2» April 2003

April 2003

4/14/2003 Partners Against Crime District 2 Meeting Minutes

Citizen Observer Patrol (COP)
NC Cooperative Extension
Emergency drill
Workshop for block captains
Violent crime in District 2
Courtwatch update
Police initiative in beat 212
Community concerns
Housing task force update
Animal Control task force update
Housing Dept. update
Animal Control update
ABC permits
PAC2 website
PAC2 elections
More community concerns
Coming up next month

Citizen Observer Patrol (COP) :Thanks to PAC2 for funding travel for Eric Hester and Newman Aguiar, who recently visited Broward County, FL, to study their COP program. Officer Hester reported on what they saw and learned from the trip, and on plans to start a similar program here in Durham. This type of program is sometimes known as Citizens On Patrol; in this case, however, the COP acronym stands for Citizen Observer Patrol, a distinction that goes to the heart of what the program is about. The purpose of this program is for citizen volunteers to provide an additional presence on the streets and to serve as eyes and ears for law enforcement. The role of COP volunteers is to observe, not to attempt to intervene. In Broward County, there are 2,500 volunteers participating in their COP program; nearby Palm Beach County has 5,000. The COP program, like a police department, is structured in a hierarchy of military rank. A liaison officer from the police department coordinates the program in each district. Orientation for new volunteers includes a four-hour training session and the issuance of a manual on policies and procedures. One of the most common concerns expressed by citizens is that there’s not enough police visibility in the neighborhoods. Durham police receive about 1500 calls every 24 hours, and the department is currently understrength due to military reservists being called up for the war. The COP program can be a helpful adjunct to law enforcement; in some areas of Broward County where this program has been implemented, they’ve experienced as much as a 65% decrease in crime rates. Their minimum age to participate is 18, though here it will probably be 21. Volunteers patrol in pairs. Each volunteer is expected to commit to at least 3 hours per month, though some do much more. Each district has a volunteer sergeant who coordinates the scheduling of COP patrols, a lieutenant who is responsible for maintaining the COP vehicles, and a captain whose administrative duties include reporting to the police department on who participated in the program and how many volunteers participated each month, the number of hours they put in on the street, and the mileage logged to the COP vehicles. In Broward County, they issued cell phones which were assigned to each car, but they didn’t recommend that approach to us because of the problems they’d had with unauthorized personal usage and battery failure in the heat. Here the plan is to use the city radio for communication; COP volunteers will use the same channel used by the ‘Eyes and Ears’ program, and radio use will be covered in the training session. Participants receive a uniform shirt and hat with the program insignia, and an ID card, to be returned if a volunteer leaves the program. We saw Newman’s proposed design for our insignia patch, with the COP logo over a background based on the Durham city flag. We’ll need at least 50 volunteers to get the program started here. The plan has to be approved by the city’s legal and risk management departments first; we hope to be ready to proceed by next month. COP can be used to focus extra visibility in a particular area-for instance, an area where there has been a rash of B&Es lately. In March there were 72 B&Es (including residential and business) in District 2; ten of these were unforced. COP volunteers can be trained to do house checks, where they go around a house and go over a security checklist, looking for things like unlocked doors or windows left open that could make the home vulnerable to burglary. In Broward County, they have a preprinted card that volunteers fill out and leave for the resident, letting them know that COP did a house check and identifying any problem or security weakness they noticed, and inviting the resident to contact the substation for further information or to arrange a free home security assessment. COP efforts in Broward County have even displaced gang activity. One factor in their success is that volunteers are local residents who often know and are known to the people in the neighborhoods they patrol. COP volunteers will have maps showing the neighborhoods and police beats they are patrolling, and contact information for the appropriate people within the police department who should be notified of things they observe. In areas where there’s an active Neighborhood Watch program, they will also have a contact list of block captains in case they need to activate Neighborhood Watch phone trees and inform residents of something happening in the area. The function of COP volunteers is always to observe and witness, and to be a visible presence in the neighborhood, but never to try to confront anyone or intervene in a situation. COP will be a great tool for getting better acquainted with the neighborhoods and identifying issues and problems.

The first step will be to get COP cars out and promote visibility; after we have a basic COP program up and running, volunteers can start being trained to do additional things, like the house checks described above, and checks for abandoned vehicles. In addition to the initial training session, there will be an annual in-service training for all participating volunteers. COP volunteers can also check on properties where residents are away. In Broward County, they have a lot of ‘snowbirds’ whose homes are empty in the off-season. Here, we could use COP to help identify vacant, abandoned houses. Older people or anyone else who may not feel able to go out and patrol can still play an important role in the COP program by volunteering to help with administrative duties. The COP program will be costly, given the expenses of vehicles, insurance, equipment, uniforms, etc., but it will still represent a savings to the police department. The biggest item in the budget of any police department is personnel; through COP, free volunteer labor can be used to provide additional visibility and awareness. Many locations around the country have similar programs and have found them to be very cost-effective. The types of crimes COP has the most impact on are B&Es, thefts, muggingsâ€¦ the same types that are a problem for Durham. That extra presence on the streets can make a big difference. Broward County’s COP program is six years old. In that time, they have never had any incident where a COP volunteer was injured, though there have been a couple of minor traffic accidents involving COP patrol cars. Broward County has an annual awards ceremony where volunteers who have contributed certain numbers of hours are recognized. Their COP volunteers are used in a variety of capacities, like helping at the Christmas parade. The plan for COP in Durham is to start with a small program focused on the most core elements, and have it grow and develop as we go along. It will begin with a group of 50 committed volunteers. The startup program will be in District 2 and tailored to District 2′s issues; later, it can be expanded throughout the city.

NC Cooperative Extension: This month’s featured speaker was Delphine Sellars, Community Outreach Coordinator for the Durham center of the North Carolina Cooperative Extension, who gave a dynamic presentation on a valuable but little-known community resource. Sellars works to empower people in the community; her role is not to dictate their needs, but to help them meet the needs they identify. She can help a community organization with organizing, recruiting, parliamentary procedures, grant writing, becoming a 501(c) nonprofit, and much more. Cooperative Extension exists and functions in every county of every US state and territory. It’s ‘cooperative’ because it’s funded by a mix of sources; local, state, and federal governments cooperate to fund their services. And it’s ‘extension’ in the sense that its programs are an extension of services, resources, and knowledge from governments and universities. Here it collaborates with our two local land-grant universities, NC State and NC A&T.
The four main areas of activity for the Durham Extension are:
(1) agricultural and natural resources
(2) family and consumer science
(3) 4H and youth development
(4) community outreach
Durham Extension also has coordinated transportation, which most counties do not. Extension services are generally free. Sometimes they charge a small fee for workshops. They write their own grants to secure funding for their work. As an example of Extension activities, Sellars told us about a senior health program they had done recently. Senior citizens participated in a workshop that included cholesterol checks, nutritional information, and more; at the end, they organized into walking clubs and were issued pedometers. As people from the community let Extension know what their needs are, Extension workers try to provide the help needed or help them find out who could provide it. They do outreach mailings to hundreds of community organizations, informing them about Extension and offering their services. Sellars cited an Extension motto: “Knowledge is the key to everything.” They know how to publicize and pull together resources to meet a need. They have a small budget of their own, but can help you apply for and get grants from other sources. Extension can’t run your programs for you, but they’ll help you get organized, find resources, and leverage volunteerism to get things done. Extension has traditionally been associated with agriculture; it’s now becoming a mix of urban and rural activity. They have a horticulture agent and master gardeners who can aid and advise with urban landscaping, and analyze soil samples. They work with kids through 4H, after-school programs, and more. They have a child development expert on staff and offer parenting classes. They also have a certified food safety instructor, who teaches restaurants about proper food handling and food safety; they provide bilingual education to reach the increasing number of non-English-speaking workers in the food service industry. They offer pesticide education that helps people with nonpolluting ways to handle pests. Extension’s philosophy is to work collaboratively with everyone else; they work with social services, health departments, job training programs, the juvenile justice system, and more. Several Walltown residents sought Sellars’s advice about their community center. Walltown’s existing community center hasn’t been improved since 1957 and can only accommodate 50 people. Residents are working to get a new community center; there have been several recent vision sessions at the School of Math & Science, and they have an architect working on designs, but the project still needs funding. Sellars suggested that if funding for a new community center is unavailable, they might look at other solutions for meeting community needs. For instance, she pointed out that most of the communities she works with aren’t fortunate enough to have their own community center, but virtually all of them have churches, and most of those churches have transportation, in the form of buses that sit idle at least five days a week. Neighborhood churches could be asked to donate the use of their buses to transport residents to a larger facility for meetings that exceed the capacity of their community spaces. Sellars said that her approach is to try to find solutions-maybe not always the ideal solution, but working solutions. She believes in the power of letters, the power of the media, and the power of numbers. Extension is “all about education in every way.” Also among their programs are summer camps for kids. Some have a thematic focus on particular skills; kids might learn a week of cooking, or a week of sewing. Extension also makes their own facilities available to neighborhood groups at no charge, on a first-come first-served basis. Their auditorium holds about 85 people, is available seven days a week, and also has kitchen facilities. An Old North Durham resident testified that OND had used the Extension facility for a neighborhood potluck and found it eminently satisfactory. Extension services tend to be underutilized because not enough people are aware of what they do. Sellars urged us all to “make her work!” Community residents or organizations who need help in any of Extension’s myriad service areas are encouraged to contact her and see how Extension can help. The Extension website is www.ces.ncsu.edu/durham ; their main phone number is 560-0525. Delphine Sellars can be reached directly at 560-0538, or by email at delphine_sellars@ncsu.edu .

Emergency drill: The School of Math & Science will be holding an emergency evacuation drill on Monday, April 28th from 2:30 to 4 pm. Students and staff will evacuate the school and walk down Club Blvd. to assemble in Oval Park. They could use volunteers to help organize this.

Workshop for block captains: On Saturday, May 17th, there will be a workshop for Neighborhood Watch block captains from District 2. Neighborhood Watch is not just for crime abatement, but can also contribute to disaster preparedness; the workshop agenda will include a Red Cross presentation on the role of Neighborhood Watch and block captains in disaster preparedness. The new Neighborhood Watch sign will also be presented at this workshop; the sign was designed by a volunteer from Trinity Park, and its design will also be used in bumper stickers and placards. The block captains workshop will be held in the Diamondview building at the ballpark, and will take place in conjunction with a safety expo, featuring a wide range of displays, demonstrations, and information related to home and community security, which will be outdoors at the ballpark and open to the public. The workshop will be held from 10 am to noon, and the expo from 10 am to 2 pm. Block captains interested in attending the workshop should contact Eric Hester at ehester@ci.durham.nc.us or 560-4582.

Violent crime in District 2: Officer Hester presented summary data on violent crimes in District 2 for the year 2002. The crime statistics were broken down by police beat, as follows:

Beat 224 (Latta Rd./Infinity Rd./Rose of Sharon):
24 robberies
8 aggravated assaults
32 total violent crimes

Beat 223 (Roxboro/Old Oxford/Dearborn):
3 rapes
33 robberies
39 aggravated assaults
75 total violent crimes

Beat 222 (Horton Rd./Guess Rd./Carver St./Murray Ave./Duke Homestead/Stadium Heights):
1 rape
24 robberies
15 aggravated assaults
40 total violent crimes

Beat 221 (Cole Mill Rd./Croasdaile Farm/mostly north of I-85, down to Hillsborough):
2 homicides
2 rapes
36 robberies
15 aggravated assaults
55 total violent crimes

Beat 214 (Duke St./Murray/Northgate Park):
1 homicide
3 rapes
32 robberies
16 aggravated assaults
52 total violent crimes

Beat 213 (Sprunt/Knox St./Braggtown area/Walltown/Watts-Hillandale/Old West Durham):
2 homicides
5 rapes
34 robberies
21 aggravated assaults
62 total violent crimes

Beat 212 (Old North Durham/Duke Park/Trinity Park):
4 rapes
55 robberies
45 aggravated assaults
104 total violent crimes

Total violent crimes for 2002, by district:
District 1 (NE Durham): 500 violent crimes
District 2 (NW Durham): 420 violent crimes
District 3 (SW Durham): 359 violent crimes
District 4 (SE Durham): 437 violent crimes
District 5 (downtown): 58 violent crimes

Courtwatch update: There was no Courtwatch meeting last month due to the war. The next meeting/orientation session will be Thursday, 17 April at 1 pm. Cases that Courtwatch will focus on this month include those of Malcolm Hubbard, accused of about 18 B&Es, and Michael Johnson, who has confessed to 70 B&Es. The meeting will be held in the community room at police headquarters, 505 W. Chapel Hill St. It should last no more than an hour.

Police initiative in beat 212: Capt. Clark announced plans for a new police initiative in police beat 212. Beat 212, bounded to the west by Buchanan and the edge of Duke’s East Campus, and to the north by Club Blvd., contains almost all of the Trinity Park, Duke Park, and Old North Durham neighborhoods, along with a bit of Northgate Park, and the area sometimes known as the ‘Green St. area’ or ‘no man’s land’. As seen in the statistics above, this beat has had the highest concentration of violent crime in District 2. Starting on May 1st, the police will be focusing their efforts on this area, with increased street visibility, vehicle stops, license checks, and foot patrols. This saturation initiative is slated to continue through May and June, after which they’ll take stock of its results. For any questions or problems related to this plan, please contact Captain Clark at the District 2 substation.

Community concerns: Walltown residents want more police patrols in their neighborhood as well. One resident reported that she was recently the victim of two B&E attempts in the same week. The suspect is known in the neighborhood as a habitual criminal who steals plants and flowers. Capt. Clark stated that this individual is currently in jail. Mention was also made of a nuisance house owned by Lee Ray Bergman. Mildred Harris Foster, homeowners coordinator for Old Farm, brought up some problems with the park in her neighborhood. The traffic there is dangerous to kids, and there’s also activity in the park at night when it’s supposed to be closed. She pointed out that these are the sort of phenomena that lead to neighborhood deterioration if allowed to continue unchecked, as those who can afford to do so move out of the neighborhood.

Housing task force update: Sharon Brown, chair of the PAC2 Housing Task Force, brought us up to date on their activities. She distributed a pamphlet the task force has put together that gives a basic overview of the city code with respect to the rights and responsibilities of landlords and tenants. They are working on another pamphlet on contacts and procedures for resolving different possible problems; it will also include information on resources and groups working for decent housing. The task force plans to disseminate this information through neighborhood associations and Neighborhood Watch block captains, and get feedback from them. They hope to put out these pamphlets in Spanish versions also, and they still need volunteers who can help with translation. Brown said she has eight volunteers working with the task force so far, and they are still seeking both people who would like to be involved on an ongoing basis, and also people who can participate as a one-time thing. If you can give even a few hours once a year, they can use your help in some capacity. In other housing-related news, Fred Foster of the Durham Voters Coalition informed us that the DVC had taken their resolution on blight to the city council, but that much of what they hoped to achieve would be undone by the provisions of Senate bill 534. This bill, sponsored by a Durham senator, will come before our city council for their consideration on Monday, April 21st. Foster urged us to make our opposition to this bill known to council.

Animal Control task force update: Alice Bumgarner, chair of the PAC2 Animal Control Task Force, gave us an update on what her task force is doing. The direction of their efforts is toward consciousness-raising in the community, and inspiring a ‘healthy fear’ by making people more aware of the dangers involved in our animal problems. The task force is working on ideas for education and grassroots community outreach; Bumgarner said that so far they’ve been working ‘below the radar’, but soon we’ll be seeing their activities come to the surface. A resident brought up a problem involving her two female dogs who were kept in a fenced yard, but attracted other dogs, one of which was owned by a neighbor who blamed her for the problem. Cindy Bailey of Animal Control addressed this issue, confirming that the dog owner was fulfilling her legal obligation to keep females in heat inaccessibly confined, and clarifying that it was the complaining neighbor who was violating the law by allowing his dog to run loose. Bailey offered to get the details from this resident after the meeting so that Animal Control could address the problem. In response to another concern raised about Animal Control response time, Bailey reminded us of the fact that she has seven officers covering a 300 square mile area, at the rate of one Animal Control officer per 12,857 households. They do prioritize calls and try to get to the most serious problems first, but even for a top priority call it may take a while for an officer to get to the location from wherever they are. In the departmental budget for next year, Bailey said she has requested three additional officers, which would allow her to station some regularly in each district and provide faster coverage. Bailey also reported a recent incident in which Animal Control officers were in pursuit of a red chow dog which had been involved in a cat attack on Maryland St. The dog took refuge in someone’s yard, and the property owner (who was not the dog’s owner) would not allow Animal Control officers to come onto their property to get the dog. The officers were legally powerless in this situation, and were ultimately unable to apprehend this dangerous animal.

Housing Dept. update: Lynwood Best informed us of some upcoming events. National Community Development week is April 21-26. The kickoff event will be at the Youth Life Foundation on Weaver St., to recognize their achievements with an initiative that uses federal funding to go into low-income neighborhoods, identify low-achieving students, and work with those kids to improve their reading ability. Project Abandoned Vehicle will be focusing on a different district each day. On April 21-23 there will be a Spanish-language workshop on homeowners’ education. Also coming up is HUD training for nonprofits interested in applying for federal funding. There will be a workshop on minor home repairs on Saturday, April 26 from 1 to 3 pm at the Home Depot in the North Pointe shopping center; to preregister for this workshop, call 683-1185. The NC Neighbors Conference will be held in Raleigh on May 9 & 10. This is a national organization, and this year is the first time NC has participated. Workshops at the conference will deal with fundraising, leadership, neighborhood safety, community development, and other issues. Registration for the conference is $20 in advance and $25 at the door; the original registration deadline of April 10 has been extended for another two weeks.

Animal Control update: Cindy Bailey reported that Animal Control has established a new schedule of swing shifts which will allow some officers to work in the evenings (while the daylight lasts) and on weekends. This will begin in District 2 and District 4; if there are favorable results, that will be an argument for more funding to expand the program. Animal Control will be targeting parks and recreation areas that have problems with loose dogs, as well as any areas where there are reports of people deliberately letting their dogs loose when they think Animal Control officers won’t be available to do anything about it. If you are aware of people in your neighborhood who habitually do this, you can help make your neighborhood a safer place by reporting them to Animal Control. You can make the report anonymously. Any information you can give will be helpful; in the case of people bringing their dogs to parks and turning them loose, residents have sometimes even been able to provide the miscreants’ license plate numbers. In the last month, Animal Control has apprehended 16 stray dogs in the Lancaster-Sedgefield-Guess Rd. area. This was made possible by tracking the dogs’ habits via reports from residents. When you spot stray dogs in your neighborhood, get as good a description as possible and do call Animal Control. If you think that someone else will probably call, or that Animal Control may not have anyone available at that time, or that the dog will be gone by the time they could get there-call anyway!! Even if Animal Control is not able to track down and pick up the dog at that particular time, your report provides valuable data which can help them to do so eventually.

ABC permits: Officer Scott Baker presented five ABC permit applications for PAC2 consideration this month. The first was from Man Bites Dog Theatre, at 703 Foster St. The application is for on-premises beer & wine. The background is clean, call history minimal, and Baker reported that he has received no objections, but several letters of support. PAC2 voted unanimously to approve the application. The next permit application was from the White House Grill & Doughnut King, a convenience store located at Roxboro & Latta Rd. The application is for off-premises beer & wine. The owner’s background is clean except for a speeding ticket, and the call history is relatively light for a convenience store. PAC2 voted unanimously to approve. A business at 811 9th St. applied for a new permit for on-premises beer & wine. The record is clean and there is almost no call history. PAC2 voted unanimously to approve. The application from Peekaboo’s Bar & Grill, a restaurant at 754 9th St., is for on-premises beer & wine. Baker pointed out that this location is technically in District 5, but since the application had come through District 2 he went ahead and presented it to us. The background is clean and there have been almost no calls to this location. PAC2 unanimously voted to approve. Los Amigos restaurant, located at 2016 Guess Rd. south of Broad St., is applying for a permit for bottled beer only, on-premises. The applicant has a shoplifting citation from 2000; the call history is negligible. PAC2 voted unanimously to approve.

PAC2 website: Former PAC2 cochair Pam Spaulding has continued to run the PAC2 website for the past several years. Pam is now leaving the district, and PAC2 is seeking a new website manager to maintain and update our site. We need someone who already has web design skills and experience. The job involves regularly updating the site with upcoming meeting dates and posting the previous meeting’s minutes; occasionally one of the cochairs will provide another document that needs to be posted to the website. The time commitment required for this basic maintenance should be only a few hours per month. If anyone is interested in volunteering for this vital job, please contact Katherine or Newman.

PAC2 elections: Next month PAC2 will be holding elections for a cochair (replacing Newman) and treasurer; both will serve 2-year terms. The cochair position is an important one if PAC2 is to remain strong and active. We need someone who is committed to the position and able to spend a significant amount of time on it. Please spread the word, and if you know someone who is ready to step up to a larger role and can bring new energy to PAC2, encourage them to come forward. Nominations should be directed to Katherine or Newman ASAP. Elections will be held in May, June is a transition month, and in July the new officers independently take over.

Community concerns: A Denver Ave. resident posed the question of whether there is a limit to how many transitional homes (‘halfway houses’) can exist in a given residential area. There’s one in her area already, and she emphasized that its residents have not caused any problems in the neighborhood, but as a homeowner with young children, she has some concerns and would like to monitor the situation and know what’s going on. She doesn’t want to see her neighborhood become a ‘dumping ground’ for this type of housing, and expressed concern about the possibility of people surreptitiously buying property and setting up more of such facilities without any advance notice to neighborhood residents. Newman responded to this by saying that the issue has come up before, and there is no legal limit on the concentration of transitional homes. The Housing department has only recently started trying to identify and map the locations of existing facilities, and that effort is currently on the back burner (due to understaffing at Housing). Richard Mullinax, president of Old North Durham, added that OND has done their own neighborhood survey to identify the locations of transitional homes and other sorts of group homes. He said that OND has had no problems with these facilities as such; the only real concern with them is their impact on the perception of the neighborhood for potential residents. Mullinax suggested that it’s important to avoid clustering-for instance, having multiple group homes on the same block-and pointed out that dispersing them throughout the neighborhood is consistent with their mission of reintegrating people into the community. He said that OND is still working on bringing group home residents into neighborhood activities, and offered to provide contacts in OND to anyone who wanted to learn more.

A second issue raised from the Denver Ave./Riddle Park area was problems with speed limit signs. There are very few speed limit signs in the neighborhood, and residents would like to see more signs put up. Also, they need to get trees and shrubbery cut back in some places so that existing signs are visible. Someone from the Dept. of Public Works spoke up on this, offering to get the details after the meeting and help get something done about it.

Another resident had several questions related to traffic calming issues. The first was whether citizens can volunteer to pay for the installation of a speed bump themselves; one has been approved for their neighborhood, but there’s no funding for it. They also asked how to get the speed limit in a particular location reduced, and how to get a 4-way stop sign put in. They’ve already had the speed trailer out to the area and documented their traffic issues. They were advised to contact the city traffic engineer, Philip Louizik, at 560-4366 for help on these issues.

Coming up next month: The featured speaker at next month’s PAC2 meeting will be Archie Smith, the clerk of court. If you’re unaware of the many important functions the clerk of court performs, this is your chance to be informed. Also scheduled for next month is the election of new PAC2 officers. The next meeting is Monday, May 12th, at 6 pm, at E.K. Powe School.

Adjourn

IMPORTANT DISTRICT II CONTACTS/INFO

Commander: Capt. Duane Clark

560-4582, cdclark@ci.durham.nc.us

Lieutenant: Eddie Sarvis

560-4582, esarvis@ci.durham.nc.us

Community Services: Tony Scott

517-7139, toscott@ci.durham.nc.us

Community Officer: Scott Baker

560-4582, sbaker2@ci.durham.nc.us

Crime Prevention Officer: Eric Hester

560-4582, ehester@ci.durham.nc.us