Residents: Put more cops in our neighborhoods

By Joe Earle

Scores of Buckhead residents, voicing anger and fear over recent high-profile crimes, recently told top Atlanta police officials that homeowners want more officers to patrol their community.

“Our concern is house break-ins... We’re worried about the sanctity of our houses and the safety of our houses,” resident Brink Dickerson said during a public meeting Sept. 10. “Zone 2 needs more cops. There’s a well-known joke that if you see a cop in Chastain Park, you should stop and offer directions, because he’s lost.” authorized to employ 2,034 officers and now has only about 70 vacancies to fill, he said. The department has about 100 recruits in training, he said.

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Many of the more than 150 residents attending the gathering at The Lodge at Piedmont Presbyterian Church applauded as Dickerson told police officials, including Chief George Turner, that “we need more cops that are visible and on our streets more of the time. ... We feel a little underserved right now.”

Maj. Van Hobbs, who commands the Zone 2 precinct, which includes Buckhead, said police are responding by putting more officers in areas where crimes regularly occur. “We will get resources,” he said. “We will put them up here and we’ll turn it around.”

Residents indicated they have been on edge since three home invasions earlier this year and more than 100 car break-ins during a single week in September.

Turner said the APD now “has more police officers on the street than we’ve ever had in this city.” The agency is

But Turner told the crowd he also thought Buckhead needed more officers on patrol. “I agree with you that you need more police officers,” he said. “We need more police officers in the city.”

Police officials said that in addition to the officers on the street, the department uses high-tech crime-fighting equipment, including a network of cameras spread throughout the city. Keeping an eye on the cameras creates “smart policing,” Dave Wilkinson, president of the nonprofit Atlanta Police Foundation, said. The department now monitors about 5,700 cameras and plans to install as many as 10,000, he said.

But homeowners weren’t satisfied. “We can talk about cameras all we want to, but we need more policemen in our neighborhoods,” Jana Unterman said.

“We can all agree on that,” Turner said.

“We’ve got to have officers on the street,” Unterman continued.