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Steve Chronister For York County Commissioner |
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Crime Response Unit (CRU) York County has been suffering from an increase in crime linked with a decline in economic development. Our citizens do not feel safe walking down the streets. Our businesses are closing. Our newspapers are scattered with headlines about crimes and drug wars. Our young people are turning too often to criminal behavior. In order to further solve the problems with crime in York County, the use of the “no tolerance” policy initiated in New York City’s government by Mayor Giuliani will empower police to crack down on small, petty crimes in order to prevent more serious crimes. While benefiting the community, this will also demonstrate to citizens of York County that the police force will respond to situations reported, and will thus create a “monster police force” within the community itself that will report crimes because they trust the police department to follow through. Many times citizens in a community do not report crimes they witness because they are unsure that the crimes are serious enough to warrant police involvement, as demonstrated in Broken Windows, but by responding to small crimes, the community will know the police department’s goal is to stop crime before it can happen. To aid our county in preventing crime and targeting all crimes, large and small, before they happen, we will reach out to all people in those communities to create the Crime Response Unit (CRU). People in underserved communities will be hired to be deployed at intersections, foot patrol and riding bikes, reporting any suspicious activity. Each division will be assigned to a particular area and will be teamed with a van, which will serve as the command center. This program will endeavor to utilize the municipal police, county sheriff deputies, local police, and state police to cut crime in York County. The CRU members will work in support of York County police, and will use police issued radios to communicate with a squad car. Instead of having isolated squad cars patrolling the streets. They can be directed from one incident of criminal activity to another, thus creating a protective network around specific areas. By having a squad car with each unit in each segment of the county, the normal police response time would go from minutes to maybe seconds because the squad car will already be within the neighborhood in question when an incident is reported. This quick response time will also discourage would-be criminals because they know they don’t have time to commit a crime and get away before the squad car shows up. The CRU will also specifically appeal to young people who maybe do not have a lot of job skills, and will provide job positions that give them skills training that they can use to pursue higher education or other employment. The CRU will not consist of typical police officers, but may be young people from the communities they are serving, trained by law enforcement to report back to an officer if they see someone painting graffiti, someone breaking the speed limit, someone littering, etc. If a citizen reports a crime in a certain area and gives a license plate number and car information for the criminal, the CRU members can also look for cars that match the description. They will be able to report all crimes to law enforcement and thus reinforce the “no tolerance” policy that we are suggesting be brought into York County’s response to crime. According to Broken Windows, the Police Foundation in Washington, D.C. developed a foot patrol project to put more officers on walking beats around the city. Based upon their results, they found that “…residents of the foot-patrolled neighborhoods seemed to feel more secure than persons in other areas… and officers walking beats had higher morale, greater job satisfaction, and a more favorable attitude toward citizens in their neighborhoods than did officers assigned to patrol cars” (4). We are proposing the use of the CRU program based upon this knowledge as a program that is specifically developed for York County’s needs. Deployment of the CRU can be based on the CompSat model of tracking crime. The CRU will also have units that can be deployed to any area in York County, in addition to having units that always cover certain areas. For example, if there is a place where a crime has occurred recently, the CRU will be called to that place to reinforce public safety and to reassure the people who live and work in that area that the police are taking action. In order for the CRU to better improve our community and to reinforce the “no tolerance” policy that we are proposing to employ in York County. The CRU will also include a County Clean-up Crew that will drive through the streets of targeted neighborhoods and clean up debris, take care of weeds in the sidewalks, paint over graffiti, etc. According to Wilson and Kelling in Broken Windows, “untended property becomes fair game for people out for fun or plunder, or even for people who ordinarily would not dream of doing such things…we suggest that ‘untended’ behavior also leads to the breakdown of community controls” (4). The County Clean-up Crew will help our community look better, which will give our citizens a better sense of security when they are walking down our streets, and will raise satisfaction in the condition our neighborhoods. The Crew will consist of small groups of around three or four people provided with a pick-up truck, and they will also have the police radios and uniforms of CRU members so they are empowered to report any crimes they may see to police officers on duty in their assigned areas. These small groups will work with the CRU to make our streets safer, our communities cleaner, and to help repair our “broken windows.” Once the CRU program is started, we can try to incorporate a system to allowing individuals assigned to community service a chance to work with the County Clean-up Crew. “Just as physicians now recognize the importance of fostering health rather than simply treating illness, so the police-and the rest of us-ought to recognize the importance of maintaining, intact, communities without broken windows” (4). Another benefit of the CRU is the increased visibility of Law enforcement. When people walk down the street and see uniformed CRU members reporting crimes and even giving directions to lost visitors, they feel safer. People are also more likely to speak to police officers and potentially report crimes when they are out on the street, versus when they are inside patrol cars. The CRU would give people a chance to speak directly to Law enforcement and provide them with a reliable link to crime prevention. The CRU is the old-fashioned community policing that provides a bridge between citizens and law enforcement to the benefit of everyone. Our proposals should have a chilling effect on people who are looking to commit crimes because we are targeting all crimes. Someone could rob a bank and then be caught for a small crime like jaywalking or littering. By targeting all crimes, we effectively discourage people from committing any crimes. We are suggesting that municipal police, county sheriffs’ deputies, local police, and state police also all work with CRU in responding to the crimes in York County. York County could use all aspects of law enforcement for a full attack against crime in our county that would endeavor to take back the county for our citizens. Our goal with this project is to empower the police department to use force amplification, to take their current staff and amplify their abilities in the communities they serve. No one should feel unsafe walking through public places in our community. No child should be afraid to go to school because of crime. Instead of trying to stop crime all at once, as has been attempted before, we propose that police take one geographic region and focus on securing that region. They can use the tactics from Giuliani’s “no tolerance” and CompStat policies to cut back on crime rates and help restore communities and businesses in that single region. Once that region is secure, it can then be expanded so more area is included and more people can benefit. We are suggesting that police first target communities that are not lost, that still have some businesses and economic development, but that are in danger of losing both businesses and population to crime. Police should aim to place CRU members in those particular communities, as has been suggested in the report Broken Windows. “The key is to identify neighborhoods at the tipping point-where the public order is deteriorating but not unreclaimable, where the streets are used frequently but by apprehensive people, where a window is likely to be broken at any time, and must quickly be fixed if all are not to be shattered” (4). We are also suggesting that police focus on keeping the “safe” communities-those with growing businesses and increasing economic development, and minimal crime rates-stable and safe. We would also call upon police to attack the entire drug business in York County. Instead of only arresting the drug dealers, as has been the general practice in the past, police will be called upon to also arrest drug buyers, effectively aiming to end the whole business. By targeting drug buyers, people who sell drugs have no one to sell to and thus cannot make profits, and by targeting drug sellers, people who buy drugs cannot continue with the habit and are either driven to leave our county or to abandon their criminal behavior. This system would also keep drug deals away from our streets and away from our citizens. The CRU members may also be able to provide assistance in this process because of their presence on the streets in the communities where many drug deals would be taking place. This way, both the dealers and the buyers will be taken off the streets in our neighborhoods and the drug business will be cut off at both ends. The CRU program endeavors to put money straight into the hands of young people who need it and help them expand their careers. The communities affected by CRU would also benefit because the CRU members would earn an hourly wage, and would put that wage back into the community’s businesses and economy, thus helping to boost economic development in York County. They now have a chance to earn money and seek careers that they may otherwise not have been able to pursue, or the chance to seek higher education. CRU management would also hold sessions with CRU members and provide assistance and resources for them to find other employment opportunities within their interests. A website would also be set up for young people to search for employment opportunities and positions available where they could use the job skills they have gained from CRU membership. CRU members could choose to apply for CRU management positions, or could if they prefer just stay in the program’s employment. Examples of other positions that CRU members could consider pursuing are: positions at the sheriff’s department, 911 dispatchers, and county/city employment positions. The CRU program makes it possible for young people in York County to follow their dreams and better their careers while improving our community. The main goal for the CRU program is to encourage young people who don’t have a lot of job skills and cannot pursue further education, and who may otherwise be driven to criminal acts, to instead choose to join CRU. CRU gives young people the chance to earn valuable job skills and to pursue either higher education or other preferred careers while reaching out to our community and learning how they can help fight crime and reach out to others. Our goals with the CRU program are
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