Anyone can be a victim of burglary or other crimes. Despite our best precautions, we often feel alone and vulnerable to crime. But there is a vital protection tool available - something residents can do by banding together, in connection with local law enforcement agencies, to prevent crime before it happens.

THE NEIGHBORHOOD WATCH PROGRAM

Here's a community-based program that's been proven to deter crime. The National Neighborhood Watch Program, sponsored by the National Sheriff's Assoc. since 1972, unites law enforcement agencies, local organizations and individual citizens in a community-wide effort to reduce residential crime. Thousands of these programs have been developed around the country helping to break down the isolation of neighbors as they work together with the law enforcement officers.
 

• Any community resident can take part- young or old, single and married, renter or home owner.

• A few concerned residents or a community organization can spearhead the effort to organize a Neighborhood Watch.

• Members learn how to make their homes more secure, watch out for each other and the neighborhood, and report activities that raise their suspicions to their local police.

• You can form a Neighborhood Watch group around any geographical unit: a block, apartment building, park, business area, housing complex, or office.

• Watch groups are not vigilantes. They are extra eyes and ears for reporting crimes and helping neighbors.

HOW TO GET STARTED

• Neighborhood Watch helps build pride and serves as a springboard for efforts that address other community concerns, such as recreation for youth, child care, and the list goes on.

• Many of your neighbors may wish that a program like Neighborhood Watch already existed in their area, but don't know how to start one. They may not realize just how simple it is.

• If you don't start a Neighborhood Watch program in your area, perhaps no one will. But once you take these first simple steps you may be amazed at how easy it is to organize the program and what a difference it will make.

• Form a small planning committee. Decide on a date and place for an initial neighborhood meeting.

• Contact the Wall Township Police Dept. at 449-7134 or your local PD. Request that a crime prevention officer come to your meeting to discuss your community's problems and needs. Ask the officer to bring a list of local and national contacts that will assist you in organizing and maintaining your program.

GETTING ORGANIZED

• Contact as many of your neighbors as possible and ask them if they would be willing to meet to organize a Neighborhood Watch group in your area.

• Once your program is beginning to get under way, there are several concrete steps you should take to make the organization solid and successful.

• Contact the Community Support Unit
  (CSU) at the PD for help in training members in home security and reporting skills, and for information on local crime patterns.

• Select a Neighborhood Watch coordinator and block captains who are responsible for organizing meetings and relaying information to members.

• Recruit new members, keep up-to-date on new residents, and make special efforts to involve elderly, working parents, and young people.

• Contact the CSU for Neighborhood Watch Signs and decals. These alert criminals that community members will watch and report their activities-often, this is enough to discourage them!

NEIGHBORS LOOK FOR...

• Screaming or shouting for help.

• Someone looking into windows of houses or parked cars.

• Unusual noises.

• Property being taken out of houses or buildings where no one is at home, or the business is closed.

• Cars, vans, or trucks moving slowly with no lights or apparent destination.

• Anyone being forced into a vehicle.

• A stranger running through private yards or alleyways.

• A stranger sitting in a car or stopping to talk to a child.

• Abandoned vehicles.
  
  Don't investigate these problems on your own! Report these incidents to the police. Alert neighbors of such situations.

DEVELOPING CITIZEN AWARENESS

Periodic meetings of your Neighborhood Watch group should be used to develop programs to heighten citizen awareness of the proper response to suspected or actual criminal activity. Speakers from law enforcement, as well as from a wide range of community organizations can address such topics as:

• Recognizing suspicious activity and learning how to report it.

• Organizing victim assistance programs.

• Establishing "safe houses" for children in trouble.

• Developing neighborhood "youth escort services" that can accompany older people and children on errands.

• Organizing a " Crime Stoppers" program that allows individuals to offer information on crimes, anonymously.

• Setting up daily Crime Watch broadcasts, mobilizing scanner owners, and publishing neighborhood newspapers with security tips and updates.

Once you get started in organizing a Neighborhood Watch, there is virtually no limit to the innovative ways to combat crime and increase involvement of members of your community. Your neighborhood will not only become safer and more secure, but will have the added benefit of neighbors brought closer together, with opportunities to rekindle the sense of community that many areas of the country have lost over the years.

A strong, healthy, united community is one of the strongest deterrents to crime! But it all has to start somewhere. It can start with you beginning today!