COMMUNITY POLICING : Innovative Valley Program Hailed as Model for the Entire LAPD

Even before the smoke cleared in South Los Angeles following the devastating riots of 1992, Los Angeles police commanders looked for a new philosophy that would improve the way the department deals with the community. And they found they were already practicing it in the San Fernando Valley.

Five Valley patrol divisions had begun laying the groundwork for a commitment to a little-known concept called community policing even before the start of the year, under the direction of Deputy Chief Mark A. Kroeker. By the time the riots of last April and May hit, the Valleywide community policing program was in full swing. And when all the post-riot commissions and police brass began planning ways to improve the beleaguered department, they cited the Valley community-policing program as a model for the police department to learn from.

In 1993, Kroeker said, he wants the Valley divisions to continue to be at the vanguard of changes in the Los Angeles Police Department, especially when it comes to community policing. “That’s going to be my big thrust in 1993,” Kroeker said, “one neighborhood at a time.”

Community policing emphasizes neighborhood crime watch activities by residents and merchants, who communicate their problems and concerns to officers freed from routine patrol to do preventive police work.

Although there are other small community policing programs in Los Angeles, none are as old or as comprehensive as the Valleywide program which Kroeker began in May, 1991, police say.

Such a program is especially important in a city like Los Angeles, where crime is rising and the number of officers is not, because it uses residents as the eyes and ears of the police department, according to Kroeker and other proponents. Residents go on patrol, keep an eye out for suspicious activity and even tell police senior lead officers of buildings and other locations that have become magnets for crime.

“In 1993, what we know will happen is that police staffing will get worse before it gets better, and that criminal opportunists will take advantage of every chance they get,” Kroeker said. “We also know that our only real unlimited resource is in the community, and it is untapped.”

Kroeker said 1993 is the year in which Valley police divisions will try to tap that resource in depth. “If we really put the heavy push on the community, I think we can really make some inroads for the first time,” Kroeker said, “even in economically troubled times and times of great staff reduction.”

And such a campaign has a lot of ground to cover.

In a Times poll taken last fall, only 14% of Valley residents polled said a community-based policing program was active in their neighborhood. And fewer than 17,000 people, or 2% of the Valley’s 1 million-plus residents, are officially enrolled in Neighborhood Watch and other community policing programs.

But the number of community participants has been rising rapidly in recent months, Kroeker said, and he expects to see that trend continue in the coming year.

If the latter stages of 1992 are any indication, getting help from the public shouldn’t be a problem. Kroeker said he and his staff have seen “an explosion” of activity on the part of residents. “Like the lilies in the pond that keep growing and pretty soon you have a whole pondful--that’s what’s happening,” Kroeker said.

In the beginning, police relied on a small but dedicated group of volunteers. “Now we have been able to get a lot of people out of the stands and onto the playing field,” Kroeker said, “including people we’ve never even contacted before.”

More than 1,600 Valley residents have made a major commitment by becoming block captains, acting as liaisons between the department’s community policing officers and their neighbors. About 300 of them are police community representatives, who organize and lead the block captains in areas with as many as 10,000 residents.

From Studio City to Sylmar, and from Woodland Hills to Pacoima, many thousands more residents and merchants have volunteered their time. They have been showing up at neighborhood meetings, public forums, cleanup and graffiti eradication efforts and even crime patrols--although police tell them to be careful to avoid confronting criminals.

In the northwest Valley, citizen observers watch hot spots and give radio tips to officers in patrol cars, videotape drug deals and record license plates of suspected drug buyers from rooftop perches.

In Pacoima, residents of one gang-ridden neighborhood took back their streets by floodlighting the area, while volunteers in Northridge organized schoolchildren into a junior Neighborhood Watch.

And during the riots, community police officers fanned out through neighborhoods, urging gang members to help keep the peace. They did, preventing several Korean-owned liquor stores from being looted.

There have been other successes. Among them: A woman was arrested in a stolen car by an officer working with a North Hollywood Neighborhood Crime Watch group. City Atty. James K. Hahn said the arrest and conviction of the woman was “an example of community policing in action.”

And an auto-theft prevention program that fizzled for lack of interest during testing in Van Nuys three years ago was launched again because of renewed interest in the community-policing program, police said. In just one day, several hundred people signed up, and the total swiftly neared 1,000 in the first weeks.

In October, 5,000 people throughout the Valley spent a Saturday engaged in “Operation Sparkle,” picking up 200 tons of trash and painting out thousands of linear feet of graffiti.

Thanks in large part to community policing, the Times Poll indicated, residents have regained trust and respect for the much-maligned Los Angeles Police Department in the wake of the beating of motorist Rodney G. King, even in the Foothill Division that polices the Lake View Terrace area where the beating took place.

Some groups have said they fear community policing could be depriving minorities of their constitutional rights, especially when Neighborhood Watch patrols accost strangers, particularly black and Latino youths, because they may fit the stereotype of gang members. However, other minority organizations, such as the Latin American Civic Assn., have praised community policing.

Whether the program has helped reduce crime remains to be seen. At first, police and residents feared that putting so many officers into community policing roles might cut down on police response times on calls for help and contribute to rising crime. Kroeker said such concerns appear to be unfounded, that response times have not seriously increased and crime has not shot up.

Gang-related killings and homicide are up somewhat, but Kroeker said other serious crimes have remained constant during the year--a promising sign, given that it will take some time to allow community policing to take hold to determine whether it can reduce crime.

In the meantime, Kroeker and his aides have been trying to get the word out. The commander of all the Valley divisions even hosts his own “Valley Crime Watch” cable television show on community policing, which is carried by cable companies throughout the Valley at 7 p.m. Wednesdays on Channel 35. The show profiles officers, provides information on Neighborhood Watch meetings and crime prevention tips and features a “most wanted” segment describing unsolved crimes and suspects being sought.