LAKEPORT — The Lakeport Police Department held a town hall on Thursday to discuss the department’s “community policing” methods help residents understand current events that affect law enforcement.
Topics covered during the meeting included legislation in regards to public safety, neighborhood watch, the police dog program, crime statistics in the city and officer training, a security camera registration program, an ongoing community survey, de-escalation and crisis intervention training, and police recruitment.
Lakeport Police Chief Brad Rasmussen said his office’s goal is to provide the public with information about the current operations in the city and the plans they have to continue with community policing.
“We appreciate the support and anything you can do to help us get our word out and improve our policing. It is your (the community’s) police department. We work for the public and we can use all the help we can get,” Rasmussen said.
Challenges the department is currently faced with include staff recruitment, according to Rasmussen and Lieutenant Dale Stoebe, who said the staffing shortage is not just with the city’s police department but is a nationwide issue.
“We are in a crisis, there is no question about this. It is not just your police department, it’s police departments all across the nation,” Stoebe said. “There is a recruiting and retention crisis going on in America relative to law enforcement. It is unfortunate.”
Stoebe said this is due to officers’ relatively low average rates of pay relative to the danger of the job, an increasing stigma around law enforcement, and the increasing demand of responsibilities such as understanding new legislation, training requirements and technologies.
The way the department and the city have addressed this, Rasmussen noted, is by looking to hire local individuals who know the community and have an established support system, increasing the rate of pay of officers and maintaining healthy management and work environment.
“I think the only way we are going to be successful is by continuing to recruit local people who grew up here and live in this community and want to give back to it and be a part of it and want to do this career, which can be very rewarding,” Rasmussen said.
Rasmussen said the job is constantly changing as society and legislation changes, and one way the department can improve its service to the community while such changes are happening is to conduct an ongoing community policing survey and get feedback from the public.
This will help the department see areas where they may need improvement while also getting the community involved, Rasmussen said. Currently, the survey has been filled out by 300 individuals, and the department is looking to get at least 500 total in the next several weeks.
Surveys can be taken either online at the police department’s website (http://www.surveysoftware.net/hostss/lpdcs.htm) or in person, at city hall or at the police department, which is located on South Main Street.
Rasmussen said that the chief concerns raised by those who have filled out the survey to date have been regarding drug use, theft and homelessness.
Another way the department has engaged the community, Rasmussen noted, is through neighborhood watch programs. There are around 15 neighborhood watch programs within the city both online and offline.
“I just want to thank Brad and the staff we have a great team here even when they are short-handed,” Lakeport City Manager Margaret Silveira said. “They are always available and they really truly believe in community policing which is so important in making our community better.”
Stoebe described a program the department has recently begun using that culls information from individuals in the Lakeport area who have security cameras installed at their homes or businesses. The information includes the location of the cameras, their scope of view, and contact data for the owners. Stoebe stressed that all the information gleaned through the program is voluntarily shared by residents.
“When we first talked about this, a lot of concern was given toward privacy,” Stoebe said. “We came up with a program that doesn’t give us access to your surveillance cameras.” The program is a way for the department “to know about those cameras, should we have some type of a crime in your neighborhood.”
— Aidan Freeman contributed to this article
