The Mayor's Take: Fighting Crime, Ensuring Public Safety

Patch: There has been a lot of discussion about crime and public safety. What are your views?

Mayor Van Dusen: We have a downward trend in crime, but we want to stay on top of it, so the (village) board has authorized a couple different things.

The board authorized a manpower study of the police department. It looks at: 'are there different ways in which to deploy our assets?' We will get that report later in the year.

The consultant doing the report is working on it.

We authorized the chief to hire new officers, regardless of the manpower report. We are at 110 (officers), and will get to 114. 

Finally, we authorized the (police) chief to purchase a mobile satellite police station. It’s specialized construction. I’m told there are a couple other departments across the country which have them. 

It’s constructed in such a way that it could serve as a command center. Like we had that microburst (storm), the chief could send it to that area and staff it and use it as a command center.

We debated-- should we have two brick and mortar satellite stations? The chief felt he could do a better job if he had a mobile station. We’re going to experiment with that.

Patch: What will it cost? 

Van Dusen: Just under $300,000. That's the physical element but then, how do you outfit it?

Patch: Any other goals regarding public safety? 

Van Dusen: To continue to expand our Neighborhood Watch program. Repeatedly it has shown its effectiveness. The chief and officers tell stories about how a Neighborhood Watch resident will see something, call 911 for help, and it will result in an arrest or prevention. 

We created a business Neighborhood Watch program so businesses would feel free to report. It's in its infancy.

The great thing about Neighborhood Watch is that neighbors receive information from police.

Patch: A lot of readers on Patch are very concerned, and a constant refrain I hear is "When is the mayor going to get out there and do something about crime?"

Van Dusen: We are working on doing a town hall meeting on crime.

We can only go by the facts. There have been some high-profile incidents. In each of those cases the perpetrator was from outside Skokie. The fellow on Oakton was from Mount Prospect.

How do you stop somebody from coming? We’ve got major retail here. What you have to do is have a police department that can handle those kinds of events in a professional manner.

In the Niles Center Road/ Skokie Boulevard incident, the perpetrator was from outside Skokie. From what we understand, it was the result of a fight between a couple families who are not in the village of Skokie. Apparently a couple had been in McDonalds and got into an argument. 

So, we’re taking a look at manpower. Do we need to deploy differently?

We'll have an increased number of police, we set a goal of 114, and then the mobile police station. We’re hoping it will give it more of a presence.

Our officers are on their routes every day, 24 hours a day. We are asking for civic engagement.

The other thing is, it isn’t just Skokie. A lot of these things happened in various places on the North Shore.  There was the hair salon bandit.

The Skokie police apprehended him. He didn’t live in Skokie. Our police are working with regional task forces. A year ago or so, January, there was a rash of home burglaries, 10 or 12, it was very disturbing.

Wilmette and Glenview also had a rash. The chiefs from the region met, exchanged information, determined 'this is the same group of burglars.' We caught them. As soon as they were caught, residential home burglaries plummeted. In  a six-week period we went from up here to down here (gesturing).

At the end of  the year, we had less residential home burglaries than the previous year and we were on the low side for the five-year average.

I meet every day with people, I talk to people.  That year, constantly, I heard, 'what are you going to do about residential home burglaries?'

They’re not up.  But, theres’s always a perception. But regardless, we do need to take action. And we will continue. As soon as we get the manpower report, we’ll analyze it. If it means making adjustments to the village budget, we will do that.

I asked the chief, the other day. He told me crime patterns have continued from last year, crime remains down this year. 

Annually, we do a report on crime--usually in December or January. The chief will do his calculations and make a report to the village board.

So we can talk about the status of crime and how much we need to devote to it. We’re in September but so far, the trend downward has continued.

Patch: You've talked about the hard numbers, but what about the soft side, that is, crime prevention efforts. Is the village engaging at-risk youth to help them and keep them out of trouble?

Van Dusen: All of our schools have after-school programs. In addition, we have begun a Big Brothers Big Sisters program. It’s over at Lincoln Junior High. We’ve done an introduction, a pilot, so we figure out the kinks. We have a close relationship with School District 69 and the high school district and all the other districts. We have five or six grammar school districts, and we have a community college in town, and then the park district.

So between the park district and schools and village, we try to have a variety of programs young people can take advantage of. We’re open to trying all kinds of new programs. The idea is give kids somewhere they can get some physical activity, a place to do their homework. If they can’t do it at home, our library has a truly wonderful, welcoming atmosphere, so if kids need somewhere to go, our library is safe, we’ve got all the resources, we’ve got great librarians.

That isn’t to say there isn’t more we can do.

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