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Community Comes Together to Fight Crime

Colchester, Vermont - July 23, 2009

Residents in a north Colchester neighborhood are fed up with a recent rise in home burglaries and they are banding together to keep each other safe.

Organizers thought maybe a dozen people would show up for their neighborhood watch meeting Thursday night. Instead dozens came to find out how they can help keep their community safe.

The meeting started as a discussion on Front Porch Forum. Neighbors were concerned about a string of 7 recent burglaries in the Clay Point area.

"We didn't feel like there was a lot of communication going, or a network for communication," said Helen Bishop, one of the meeting organizers.

Local resident, Kevin Williams, has been arrested in connection with three of the burglaries and could be charged with at least one more. He has been released on bail and neighbors are worried he, or someone else, might target their homes again.

"I want to be more proactive and get to know our neighbors and talk about what we can do because it's on the rise, it's all over the news in the area," said Bishop.

At Thursday's meeting the neighbors learned from police officers what a neighborhood watch group is, and what it does. The main idea, according to the police, is to help people get to know each other better so they can take care of each other. For example, police say if parents are at work during the day and leave teenagers at home, a friendly neighbor will know to keep an eye on the house from time to time and if they notice something strange, check in with the kids or call the parents.

"Neighborhood watch lets you do those kind of things because you build up trust in your neighbors," Detective Michael Fish of the Colchester Police Department told the neighbors.

After the meeting the Clay Point community decided they would form a watch group. Bishop hopes it will open communication between neighbors.

"I think when you have a face to put with a name you might take better care of your neighbor," she said.

Neighborhood watch groups have become more and more common in the last few years. A South Burlington community formed one last spring in response to a shooting there. Police have credited stronger watch groups with reductions in crime in some areas.

Bianca Slota - WCAX News