Watch Out

     This past year I started feeling like I needed to be more involved in the community so I started going to Community Council meetings.  I've been going for about 6 months or more.  Even though they're long, there is so many interesting things happening outside my door that I normally don't pay much attention to and I'm glad now that I've involved myself in my neighborhood activities more.  There are reports each month from the Fire Department and the Police Department talking about local safety hazards and events that have happened.  The mayor's office also sends someone to talk each month about what the city has planned or is working on and to find out any concerns or questions that local residents have.  We also have a key note speaker each month.  Sometimes it's people from local schools or from organizations involved in local environmental issues etc. 

    A few months ago our council chairman started talking about setting up neighborhood watch programs in the area and asked for volunteers to be block/street captains to start implementing these programs on our streets.  I volunteered to be the captain for my street.  I know, like I needed another thing on my plate...but I'm still glad to be involved.  There was a meeting with a liason from the local police department about what kind of program they were encouraging, which is NOT the patrolling around neighborhoods in the dark kind of program...too many liability issues.  This past week I had our first meeting.  I went to every house on my street and handed out flyers inviting my neighbors to a meeting to discuss setting up the program.  There weren't as many people as I would have liked at the meeting, but I hope it was helpful to the people there.  We first talked about meeting our neighbors, an important step since if you don't know your neighbors (which I'm notoriously bad at) you don't know who does and does not belong in your neighborhood.  It makes it harder to recognize suspicious activities.  We also talked about how to make your home safe: never leave doors unlocked, cut back shrubs so it eliminates places to hide, add motion sensor lights, make sure windows are secured, have a dog or a security system (even sometimes just having signs that you have one is a deterrent).  

     We also talked about safety concerns on our street.  One that was brought up is poor lighting.  We have few lampposts on our street and the ones we have are not bright enough for help much with seeing at night.  The following night was Community Council meeting where we brought up this lighting concern with our newly elected city chairman who I was impressed with; he immediately made a beginning plan to get us better lighting on our street, which I will be happy to report back to the neighborhood watch when I email them this week and update them on the matter.

     I sent around a sign up sheet also, at the watch meeting so that we have names and phone numbers and can contact each other with concerns and also to communicate new happenings and coming meetings.  Our next meeting will be in six months.  By that time, I asked everyone to talk to a few of their neighbors and let them know the things we talked about and that we are planning a new meeting in July: a block BBQ to get to know each other better and involve more of our neighbors.

     As we were driving to the meeting the other night Lyle took my hand and said, 'I'm proud of my wife, she's so civilly minded.'

     Aw, shucks.  Thanks, honey.