Decline in Petty Theft Cuts Ojai Crime by 12%

In tiny Ojai, where drug offenses and domestic violence are the biggest worries of police, crime dropped 12% last year, entirely because of a large reduction in petty thefts.

Reported crime dropped from 200 in the year 2000 to 177 last year as small-time thieves stole just 83 times, instead of 115 the previous year, according to the Sheriff’s Department, which acts as Ojai’s police agency.

“We don’t have a tremendous population up here,” Sgt. Ken Edling said. “So it doesn’t take much for the numbers to change dramatically.”

Minor thefts were probably down so sharply, Edling said, because deputies cracked down last year on transients under the influence of alcohol.

Ojai, the county’s smallest city with 8,000 residents, draws homeless people every winter in response to quality accommodations in the community’s church-sponsored homeless shelter program, Edling said.

“Our deputies have asked them why they come to our shelter, and they say the food’s better,” Edling said.

But, he said, at the beginning of March each year when the shelter closes, many transients return to the river bottoms in Ventura and Oxnard.

In the meantime, the Sheriff’s Department finally has the staffing to enforce laws, which deputies think makes a difference in petty thefts. The department’s Ojai Valley force, which includes 11 officers for the city of Ojai, had been short-staffed.

But its 22 patrol deputies are now up to 30 or more, and that makes a difference in the enforcement of minor offenses, Edling said.

“We’ve stepped up our bike patrols, and they’re arresting these guys for alcohol abuse,” he said, adding that transients had kept to the shelter at night, but during the day “we’ve had problems with some of them victimizing businesses.”

The city’s most serious crimes--felony violence--rose from 16 offenses to 20 last year, as rapes increased from zero to two and robberies from one to three.

“I don’t think there’s anything to make of that,” Edling said. “The numbers are so small.”

Meanwhile, home burglaries were up by one and business burglaries increased by six. Auto thefts increased by one, to six.

“I’d say the biggest things here are drugs, and we have a lot of domestic violence issues up here,” Edling said. “But we’re out of that [crime] loop along the freeway. We’re kind of like an island up here.”