Thomas MacMillan Photo
Veteran Dixwell block-watcher Ruth Henderson speaks up at Wednesday’s citywide gathering.
If a Burton Street block watch captain sees a suspected bike thief headed toward West Elm Street, how can she warn that area’s neighborhood crime-fighting group? Is there even a block watch there?
Those questions emerged Wednesday evening at a citywide meeting of neighborhood block watchers at police department headquarters.
An answer emerged, too.
At least, the promise of an answer emerged: The police department vowed to create a map of all existing block watches in the city, and help neighborhood crime-spotters to share tips with each other.
It was the first step in a new effort to build up the city’s block watches, neighborhood groups that keep an eye out for crime and pass information along to cops. Police Chief Dean Esserman called Wednesday’s meeting in response to a suggestion (in this article) by mayoral candidate Matt Nemerson, who said the city should “reintroduce block watches.” Esserman concluded that the police should work to reenergize block watches across town and link them together.
So at 5 p.m. Wednesday, some 40 people gathered in a fourth-floor conference room at police headquarters on Union Avenue. The crowd included current and aspiring block watchers, community management team members, and Aldermen Doug Hausladen and Barbara Constantinople.
“I apologize for taking a year to give you a call,” said Esserman (pictured). “There shouldn’t be two streets in the city that don’t have block watches.” He announced he was there to listen.
He also announced that the department is working on ways to share more information with block watches, via its website. “Anything I see, you should see.”
A Westville block-watchers said her group covers only one-block Burton Street. The neighboring streets don’t seem to have block watches, she said. If bikes are being stolen on Burton Street, she asked, whom can she warn in the surrounding neighborhood?
Michael O’Leary (pictured), who lives on Everit Street, said East Rock has “a lot of little” block watches. “We’re all interconnected with a captains network,” he said.
“There’s got to be a map,” he suggested. A map of all the block watches in the city would show “where the patches are,” where the gaps in neighborhood coverage are, so that they can be “filled in.”
Savannah Smith, project coordinator for the police department, promised to put together such a map by the next meeting of the group, at the end of July. Esserman promised Wednesday’s would be “the first of many” such meetings.
“Deputy District Managers” Debut
Toward the end of the meeting, Assistant Police Chief Luiz Casanova (pictured) asked people to raise their hands if they know their local district manager, the top cop in each of the city’s 10 districts. Most people raised a hand.
Do you know your beat cops? he asked.
Fewer hands went up.
How about your “deputy district manager”? Casanova asked. He was met with quizzical looks.
Casanova explained that the department a few months ago instituted a new system of “district sergeants” or “deputy district managers,” sergeants who are on duty in each district during the B Squad shift, from afternoon into the evening.
The idea is to have a point person for each district during some of the hours when the district manager is off duty. These sergeants work closely with the district manager, and are being trained eventually to move up into that position, Casanova said. And they can serve as point people for reenergized block watches.
