By Christopher Durr
Enterprise writer
Mill Creek residents Tom and Valerie Young had seen the vandalism and heard about drinking and drug use in Nickel Creek Park behind their house. After a couple of house invasions and burglaries in the neighborhood, they had had enough.
“The police said we were ‘sitting ducks’ because of where our house was,” Valerie Young said.
The Youngs, who have lived in the community for five years, decided to take matters into their own hands and form a block watch program in their neighborhood, Winslow.
They invited several families in their neighborhood to come to a meeting and asked Community Service Officer Michele Pellettieri to speak about neighborhood safety. The Youngs said their neighbors’ response was amazing.
About 30 couples promised to stay with the program, she said. The first thing the block watch did was put up signs informing the public that they were being watched.
Tom Young helped to designate 10 captains, specific people that keep an eye on certain areas of the neighborhood. These “captains” each watch over five or six houses and have a list of the occupants and the usual vehicles that should be in the neighborhood.
Another Winslow resident also maintains a “list server” that allows community members to upload information about suspicious people, which then is available for the 70-plus Winslow block watch.
“Basically, if we see something funny, we can post it and tell others,” Valerie Young said.
The training and system has already proven to be effective.
The Youngs said there was a recent incident where a woman was walking her dog through the nearby Amberley neighborhood and saw two “scruffy” individuals that seemed as if they didn’t belong in Winslow. She made sure that the people knew that she saw them, then went home. The woman later saw the people coming out of a neighborhood backyard and called the police. They arrived within two minutes, Valerie Young said.
“What she did was thwart any possible break-in,” she said. “People didn’t used to call 911, but now they do.”
Since June 1, there have been five burglaries in Mill Creek, bringing the year’s total to 105. That is the highest number of burglaries in one year in Mill Creek’s history, according to police, and there are still six months left in the year.
Tom Young theorized that the openness of Mill Creek’s parks and nearby business town center might have attracted more criminal-types to the area.
“Our neighborhood is trying to do what we can to help prevent crime and keep Winslow a safe, secure place to live,” he said.
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