Is anyone else tired of the snow and cold weather. I guess if you like winter sports this is when you can do them. I do like to snowshoe and take winter photographs, so I guess I can't complain too much.
I've been thinking recently about crime prevention. I was told a few weeks ago that crime prevention was an outdated idea. I'm not sure I could ever agree with that. The alternative is to do nothing and let the games begin. Sometimes it seems like we're already there.
I know when I took my first class in crime prevention I was a police officer in Bellevue, Washington. It seemed like such a good idea to me that I spent 17 years working with my community to help prevent or at least reduce crime. I think that crime prevention is everyone's business and if you're not part of the solution you may well be part of the problem.
Recently on the news it spoke of a serious increase in Billings of auto thefts. Now there are many ways to keep cars from being stolen, one of which is not to leave them running outside your home because it's cold. I think the number they were talking about was well over 700 cars that had been stolen in the past year. Until I saw that newscast, I hadn't heard about car theft as being such a problem.
Crime Prevention was originally a main part of the Metropolitan Police Act that was passed in London in the 19th century by Sir Robert Peel the act that started the first uniformed police agency in the world. In that act it was decided that promotions were to be based on absence of crime in a police officer's jurisdiction. Unfortunately when the began, they had no idea how much crime there was and we've been chasing our tails ever since.
Every day we can pay attention to what's going on and take steps to make ourselves, our neighbors and others around us safer. But it's something we have to do consciously. The original definition of crime prevention from the National Crime Prevention Institute at the University of Louisville which has been adopted by virtually all crime prevention programs is: the anticipation, recognition and appraisal of a crime risk and the initiation of some action to remove or reduce that risk. Fairly straight forward and often simple. Something we should all practice.
Alex E. Ward, CPP
Board Certified in Security Management (American Society for Industrial Security)
MCPA in conjunction with the Yellowstone County DUI Task Force and Q2 produced these DUI PSA's. They paint a sad picture of DUI in Montana and have been viewed on television as well as on you tube. This is one way we can educate folks as to things they need to know about crime.
