War on Gangs Badly in Need of More Soldiers : Some Residents Are Fighting Back, but Many Still Won’t

A little more than four years ago, The Atlantic magazine published a seminal work on the concept of community-oriented policing. The comments of an unidentified sergeant in the Los Angeles Police Department, contained therein, are worth repeating. They are still relevant today, particularly in those parts of the Valley where residents have little sense of control or confidence about the crime they face.

“When people in this district see that a gang has spray-painted its initials on all the stop signs, they decide that the gang, not the people or the police, controls the streets. When they discover that the Department of Transportation needs three months to replace the stop signs, they decide that the city isn’t as powerful as the gang,” the sergeant said.

The solution, which we have supported, was to move from incident-oriented police work toward programs in which law enforcement, government and communities worked together to declare that they--and not the criminals--are in control.

Here in the Valley, it is apparent that some neighborhoods have embraced the concept and are doing much to assist a Police Department that has a lower officer-to-citizen ratio than most large cities. In Washington, D.C., for example, there are more than eight local police officers for every 1,000 residents, not including thousands of federal officers. In Los Angeles, there are 2.2 officers per 1,000 residents, and just 1.1 officers per 1,000 in the Valley.

To help out, in the Devonshire area of the Valley for example, a Volunteer Surveillance Team has walked the streets of their neighborhood since last year and reported “taggers” at work in their vandalism.

In Studio City, a residents association is spending $4,500 on walkie-talkies so that they can maintain a watch on the streets in their southeast Valley community, reporting crimes and suspicious activities directly to police officers who will also be carrying such radios. These residents seem to be aware of the fact that this type of activity must be confined to the observation and reporting of suspected illegal activity, and that they can in no way take the law into their own hands.

These efforts are commendable, but it is also apparent that they are not occurring in some parts of the Valley where the combination of an emboldened citizenry and less incident-oriented police work is badly needed.

Just such a neighborhood, one that sounds very much like the community that LAPD police sergeant described four years ago, can be found around Tiara Street in North Hollywood. Because of the solitary efforts of one resident--Viviana Guerra--the neighborhood’s problems have been put before the public and the justice system. Guerra alone, in her community, has reported crimes and testified in court. That has made her the target or more than 50 cases of harassment and vandalism.

This past week, a gang member was finally convicted of making a terrorist threat against her, even though no witnesses were brave enough to corroborate her testimony. It is apparent that Guerra’s neighbors feel that a powerful street gang controls Tiara Street--not the police or the local government. Perhaps that is why they are so fearful of taking a stand, and why they have rejected every chance thus far to report suspected illegal activity, much less testify in court, as she has done.

This neighborhood is not in some isolated part of town. It is located just one block from an LAPD station. It is time that a redoubled effort is made, by police and elected officials alike, to reach out to this terrified community. We’re talking less here about an incident-oriented response, and more of the kind of regular contact with residents that gives them a sense that something can be done to reclaim their streets. That is where the next battle against an occupation force of gang members ought to be fought.