The fear of crime alone can be detrimental to communities. People become distrustful of each other as well as of the police. They feel the police are ineffective and unable to maintain order. Fear often affects the city's image and becomes a key factor in its economic development. When citizens are queried about neighborhood problems, they talk less of crime and more about social disorder and physical decay.
Crime is merely a symptom of strong social forces.
Abandoned houses, inadequate lighting, drunks, litter, parking problems, and loitering, not just criminal activity, are just as important to citizens. These issues surely affect our city's image and add to the fear of crime. Traditional policing concepts of preventative patrol and rapid response became widely accepted tactics and have been utilized by our department. However, research has shown that rapid response is only effective in a small percentage of cases where life is threatened or a crime is in progress. Unfortunately, this practice forced us to spend the majority of our time responding to all calls for service as quickly as we could.