COP Program Arrests Crime in Santa Ana

Father Christopher Smith remembers when the police were seen as invaders at St. Joseph’s Church. Twice, officers marched into Sunday services to arrest gang members in pews, offending Smith and a community that looks to the church as a sanctuary and a much-needed anchor among troubled streets.

“I don’t think that would happen anymore,” said Smith, a pastor at the Lacy neighborhood church for six years. “Now there is communication. Now there is cooperation. The police are not seen with fear like before.”

Smith’s words are a testament to the impact of a new way of doing business by police working in the historic neighborhoods in this city’s northeast corner. For seven months, the federally funded Community Orientated Policing (COP) task force has used tactics such as foot patrols, school visits and neighborhood partnerships to tackle the area’s entrenched crime.

The results, according to a department report sent to the City Council Friday, show a dramatic drop in crime in the area targeted by the federal “Clinton Cops” program.

There’s been a 60% drop in armed robbery from the same six months in 1994, along with a 42% decrease in assaults and a 53% decline in burglary and thefts, according to the report. Citizen calls reporting drug dealers have dropped 68%, and overall calls for service fell 41%.

The statistics may chart the breadth of the program’s activities, but the words of people in the neighborhoods--including French Park, Lacy and Willard--tell the story.

“Drug dealers and prostitutes used to approach my staff as they came up 15th Street,” said Willard Intermediate School Principal Robert Butcher, a 28-year resident of the Willard neighborhood. “No longer does that happen. It’s been cleaned up.”

The tools of the cleanup have been as varied as handing out traffic tickets and mounting large undercover drug operations. Trespassing citations, towing cars and roadblocks have put a crimp in the sidewalk commerce of dope dealers, while undercover officers have taken both buyers and sellers off the streets, Santa Ana Police Lt. Dave Nick said. The department also has sought to prosecute drug buyers in the area for felonies, rather than the misdemeanors typical for such offenses, he said.

“From Long Beach to San Clemente, people knew that they could drive up to Santa Ana, up to Willard, to buy drugs,” Nick said. “Not anymore.”

The cleanup also took on a literal meaning. Police officials, citing the theory that dilapidated neighborhoods are more likely to breed crime and decay, set up the task force as a liaison to other city services. For example, couches left in alleys are removed more quickly by sanitation workers, graffiti is cleaned up and property owners are told to get broken windows fixed.

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Police say the foundation concept of the COP program is to bring police closer to the community and, by then listening to residents’ fears and concerns, tailoring law enforcement to find long-term solutions.

Nick offered an example: Groups of men were gathering on several corners for all-day card games. The men would drink and, sometimes, urinate in public. The situation would likely not be a priority to police in a high-activity city such as Santa Ana, but because residents expressed anxiety about the situation, the task force began a concerted effort to issue citations and, in one instance, persuade a group of older men to move their long-standing card game indoors.

Police have also used the threat of Safe Streets lawsuits to prod several property owners to rehabilitate their buildings. The lawsuits, used effectively by organized residents in other cities, can slap property owners with civil penalties if their buildings can be shown to be centers of criminal activity.

The threat of those lawsuits and a unified effort by residents and police led to a dramatic change in life on Spurgeon Street, said Ed McKie, president of the French Court Assn. A year ago, McKie kept his shades drawn and avoided walking near windows for fear of stray bullets. When he did peer down on Spurgeon, he said, he often saw groups of gang members leaning into car windows and exchanging packages for money.

“We were afraid to walk out on our porches because of the gunfire,” McKie said. “There was graffiti everywhere, marking anything that wouldn’t move and even some cars. . . . Now when I look out I see children playing, couples walking up to the market. Now you really have to keep an eye out to find any gang activity at all.”

McKie, a four-year resident, said Spurgeon Street has been rescued by the unified front of residents and police. Residents were educated by police on how to monitor illegal activities--becoming eyes and ears for police--and then officers followed up diligently.

“There’s no more gunfire at night,” McKie said. “When I get up to get a drink of water at 1 a.m. and I look out the window I see two police officers walking down the street on patrol. It’s just great.”

Instead of cruising in a patrol car, officers ride bikes and walk among residents, said Sgt. John Follo, who heads one of the program’s two teams of officers.

“We get to know people and they get to know us,” Follo said. “That’s the key.”

Follo was the officer chosen to share the stage with President Clinton when the chief executive came to Santa Ana last year to talk up the federal program, which provides three-years grants for community policing in 105 cities and counties in California.

In Santa Ana, the city matched a $1.73-million federal grant to set up the program, which targets the Civic Center and downtown business areas and the neighborhoods of French Court, French Park, Lacy and Willard.

In those areas, police stagger the schedules of the special teams that work alongside regular police patrols. Street criminals learn the shift hours of police and tailor their activities to sidestep patrols, but the COP units never fall into a pattern that can be exploited. They work the areas seven days a week, 12 hours a day.

At St. Joseph’s, where uniforms were once eyed warily, the task force eased some tensions by serving as security at the Catholic church’s October festival, an informal setting that allowed officers to meet parishioners. Officers also met with church leaders to offer security tips--such as building a wall around the parochial school’s playground.

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Parish director Anne Roth said the rapport has given police a valuable foothold in the community. The church is a central fixture in the community, and police can have a far better understanding of local problems and trends by tapping into the church’s lines of information, Roth said. In turn, the community gets a more effective police department.

“I see their new philosophy as sort of preventive medicine,” Roth said. “They’re not just responding to symptoms, they’re addressing the causes, at least that’s how I see it. There is certainly a new trust level in the neighborhood.”

In the past, large-scale police sweeps would stub out neighborhood crime for days or weeks, but the benefits of the one-time operations were short-lived.

“After those big operations, we would leave and the problem would fill right in again,” Nick said. “But this is different. This time we’re here to stay.”

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Down on Crime

A section of downtown Santa Ana targeted for neighborhood policing has seen a significant drop in crime since 15 additional officers have been on the streets. Crime statistics from the first six months of the federally funded program compared to the same period the previous year:

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Type of Crime June-Dec. 1994 June-Dec. 1995 % Change Robbery 167 67 -60 Assault 246 144 -42 Burglary, theft 888 418 -53 Auto theft 196 122 -38 Disturbing the peace 1,802 1,418 -22 Narcotics complaints 784 256 -68 Total calls 4,083 2,425 -41

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Source: Santa Ana Police Department; Researched by GEOFF BOUCHER / For the Times