Proactive Policing: Tackling Low-Level Crimes Through Community Engagement

Abstract

Question Five: Low-Level Crimes As a police chief, I would focus on proactive response to low-level crimes that have created concern among the members of the community. Reactive policing is expensive and is not effective in actually preventing crime or lowering the effects of crime on victims. While most crimes require reactive responses that are made after victims file reports, the method is expensive. In particular, it would be costly to use reactive methods to deal with low-level crimes when they occur frequently and the members of the community request for police involvement. An effective method, however, would be the proactive strategies that involve the members of the community in responding to policing issues. As the police chief, I would involve the members of the community in response to undesirable behavior such as public urination. Each time officers respond to calls for such low-level crimes, resources useful in preventing other crimes would be wasted. With the involvement of the community, proactive response to this issue would reduce the number of instances where officers are required to respond to the community’s concerns. To implement this approach, I would identify the institutions in the community likely to offer support in dealing with the issue. In particular, identifying the organizations with members likely to be involved in crime as victims or perpetrators improves proactive responses by police officers. In this case, the police would need to partner with organizations such as schools, sporting teams, and groups working with the homeless population. The best strategy to get in touch with individuals associated with a particular policing issue is to target the organizations they may join or work with in the community. For instance, local athletic teams are likely to involve majority of the youth in the community while...