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By MARY FRANCIS STOUTE
Contributing Writer
PUBLISHED OCTOBER 27, 2011
Albany residents met with members of the Albany Community Police Advisory Committee Tuesday at the La Salle School. The forum allowed residents to share their concerns about their neighborhoods.
The Albany Police Department hopes to fix these problems through community policing, which encourages the police to have an active role in issues that go on in the neighborhoods. Their goal is to eliminate crime and the fear of crime by inspiring and empowering the community to work together to improve the quality of life and to make Albany a safer community.
Members of the Advisory Committee, which was formed in September 2009, were appointed by the Common Council. The committee holds forums throughout the city so that voices can be heard from different neighborhoods. They hope this approach gets the public more involved and builds a relationship between the police and the community.
The Neighborhood Engagement Unit works with the committee to monitor problems. Their job is to patrol different areas and interact with the community. The unit is made up of some 27 beat officers who are part of this unit and they work daily as a team. Lieutenant Michael Tremblay of the Neighborhood Engagement Unit helps with these efforts.
“We work to engage the community, to play a more active and interactive role in problem identification and resolution, using a problem oriented policing philosophy. The goal is to come up with more permanent solution sets to neighborhood specific problems,” he said.
Tremblay has seen improvements made through community policing.
“Participation and feedback has been extremely high and has helped shape the course that the Albany Police Department has taken in the pursuit of true Community Policing,” he said.
Pine Hills Neighborhood Association member, Mary Dugan, has seen improvements in the Pine Hills. She manages properties on Hudson, Hamilton, and Quail street and is optimistic about Albany Police.
“I didn’t want to report any problems because of the lack of interest, but the police have improved by 200%,” Dugan said. “The police are interested in knowing what’s going on and they are responding to complaints.” Students know that they are no longer able to get away with certain behaviors because of the presence of beat officers, she said.
Albany Police Chief Steven Krokoff, wants to get people to understand that their voices are being heard.
“We have met with people who represent groups that are difficult to reach. We have groups that have never coexisted,” he said.
Feedback from the community will only help to build relationships and improve the city.
“There were trust issues between the community and the police department, but we are moving forward quicker than we anticipated” he said.
