The Morgan Hill police and city staff want to know how safe the city’s residents feel in their homes and neighborhoods, how much they trust local law enforcement and to ensure officers are qualified and trusted to maintain public safety.
It’s part of the forthcoming “outcome based” public safety plan, which was requested as one of the city council’s goals for 2011.
Chief David Swing presented a draft of the plan to the council at a recent meeting. The plan is based on public workshops and other community outreach during the past year, and lists four outcomes the police and city will strive for:
-Reduce incidents of crime and traffic collisions
-Increase trust and confidence in the police department
-Increase feeling of safety
-Increase proficiency of staff
Each outcome includes a series of measurement criteria, such as a reduction of traffic collisions resulting in injury, and in person and property crimes by 5 percent each, Swing said.
And to “increase proficiency of staff,” the department will work to ensure officer certifications and training are up-to-date, Swing said.
A key part of the effort to increase trust in the police department and feelings of safety in the community is to deploy new volunteers trained under the city’s new “volunteers in policing” program, Swing said.
The next step in the strategy is to conduct an extensive survey among Morgan Hill residents, to determine how safe they feel in their neighborhoods and public places, and what their current level of trust in local safety efforts is, Swing said.
The chief noted the strategy is a long-term plan, and is currently envisioned to apply through 2015.
Council members have characterized an “outcome based” plan as distinct from an “input based” one that measures results of safety efforts solely on the numbers of incidents of crime, traffic accidents, fires and medical emergencies. The newer strategy could allow the city to use its declining resources to take a wider, telescopic view of their safety efforts rather than an up-close, staff-intensive outlook while achieving the same or better results.
A handful of residents polled in south Morgan Hill Wednesday said they feel safe wherever they go in the city, but they use “common sense” to avoid potentially dangerous situations such as darker, unlit areas or parks at night or by themselves.
One resident in the area of the Community Park, near the intersection of Cosmo and Del Monte avenues – the site of the Nov. 4, 2011 drive-by shooting that left 14-year-old Tara Romero dead and three other teens injured – said she felt safe in her neighborhood until the shooting and an even more recent mugging.
“I don’t feel comfortable. Raising a family, you don’t want to be living (close) to an apartment complex,” said the resident, who lives with her husband and two small children near the Village Avante apartments. She requested to remain anonymous.
The resident added she has seen more police in the neighborhood since the shooting, though the family still avoids the nearby Community Park at night.
“Since the shooting, you look at things differently,” she said.
