Police, residents urge Columbians to get involved in Neighborhood Watch

Eleven years ago, Irwin Schneider moved to south Columbia and settled down in the Cascades neighborhood. Since then, he’s been working to strengthen neighborly relationships through the city’s Neighborhood Watch program, which has been established in Columbia for more than 20 years.

He recently became the president of the Columbia Neighborhood Watch program as a whole.

Schneider said some neighbors got together to start it and the program buzzed along in the Cascades for several years until a rash of vandalism between 2011 and 2012 caused neighbors to think about revitalizing the program.

“It got reinvigorated about three years ago when we had a coordinator for the whole neighborhood come in,” said Schneider. “She was the prime mover to get everybody to sign up to be block captains.”

Since the Cascades already had a program in place, Schneider said it just needed a little push when the vandalism happened. But he warns that neighbors should be proactive instead of reactive.

“That’s what generally prompts people to want to get involved,” he said. “Something has happened in their neighborhood and that’s why we say we’d like them to join before something happens to hopefully prevent those types of activities from going on.”

Columbia police officer and Neighborhood Watch liaison Amy Bishop also stressed being proactive, but also said since the police doesn’t always know what’s normal in a neighborhood or not, neighbors are the first line of defense to let officers know.

“You’re going to know if that car doesn’t belong at that house,” she said.

Bishop and a board of volunteers put on six training sessions throughout the year all over the city for people who are interested in starting the program. They’ll explain what the program is, including how to start, how to participate and how to become a block captain.

If 50 percent of the households on a block get trained for the program, it will receive a free Neighborhood Watch sign. If most of the households in the neighborhood get involved, the sign can be put at the neighborhood entrances.

“We emphasize that it’s not you going out and being police officers,” said Bishop. “It’s more about communicating with your neighbors and just getting the community that you used to have back in the old days.

The goal is to get neighbors talking to each other and getting to know each other to prevent or deter crime. Neighbors are encouraged to keep an eye on what’s going on and call police if there is anything suspicious happening.

“Generally speaking, criminals know if there’s a neighborhood watch going on, and it’s active in a neighborhood they will be more thoughtful about breaking in,” said Schneider. “They may go to another neighborhood so if you have a neighborhood next to you that has a neighborhood watch and you don’t, you might want to think about having one in your neighborhood, too.”

Schneider and Bishop agree that they are hoping to get more participation from the strategic neighborhoods the police department has identified as crime hot spots. Bishop said some residents are nervous to talk to police and each other .

“I don’t know what would prevent neighborhoods from wanting to be involved because it’s only something that can help themselves and their neighbors be safer,” said Schneider.

Bishop said she thinks private training sessions for individual neighborhoods are also important because instead of sitting next to someone from a different neighborhood at a public training, people can have a private one with at least 15 members of their own neighborhood community.

“When the neighbors get together in an open forum I feel like that sets the precedent for them to feel more comfortable talking to each other,” she said. “It’s kind of a barrier to go next door to your neighbor you don’t know and knock on the door.”

Since the rash of vandalism a few years ago, Schneider said the neighborhood hasn’t experienced much serious crime. In the past seven years, according to online crime reports, vandalism numbers are down and violent crime is almost non-existent.

“It’s not always about specific numbers of crime rates going down,” said Bishop. “It’s about people’s perception in feeling safer in their community.”

There will be a public training March 7 at Gentry Middle School. Another will be held April 11 at Lange Middle School.

A link to the Columbia Neighborhood Watch website can be found here.

A link to a study by the US Department of Justice about the effectiveness of Neighborhood Watch programs can be found here.