Harry Stone Crime Watch #1155

MEETING MINUTES - 8/31/09

Points Discussed at our Meeting

We began the meeting with a representative from the Dallas Police.  He only had until 7 p.m. due to another meeting he was to attend so he spoke first.  The Officer gave a list of Crime Stats from 7/27 - 8/31/09 from Beat 225.  On that list, there were 10 arrests that were made in reference to crime in our reporting area.  He gave an update to the Murder which happened on 7/29/09.  He said that the Grand Jury had not yet convened on the two men arrested and charged with Capital Murder as of yet.  However, due to the fact of the type of charge being brought against them, there is no bail that will be set for either of the two men.  He also had a few handouts of a sheet that gave information about Robbery Prevention.  This has been discussed several times at our meetings over the years, however, it was still good to be reminded since there are so many things in this handout you couldn't possibly remember them all.  I know there have been handouts of this numerous times for our area, so if anyone needs a copy, please let me know.  He provided very detailed information and was very good about answering questions.  After speaking for 35 minutes, I thanked him, then he left and I began with our agenda.

REASON FOR LENGTH OF TIME BETWEEN MEETINGS - I began the meeting by telling everyone what had been going on with me that had prevented me from having a meeting for some time.  Since our last meeting, I lost everything on my computer and had it replaced with a brand new computer (old one was under warranty) and it took 31 replacements and 13 months before I received one that worked at least well enough to help with everything I do, and I also lost my brother to cancer, my niece, my cousin who was like an uncle and an uncle.  There are other things as well, but there are too many to go into.  I was very brief, then moved on to the other topics.

ANNOUNCEMENTS - I reminded everyone about using the computer at the library for free, what our web address is (http://www.harrystonecw.org), change in way of notification for everyone and mentioned that we needed volunteers and that whoever could help to please come to the front of the room after the meeting to sign up.  Then I announced that the City Council wants to include the Harry Stone Swimming Pool in their list of pool closures in the 2010 Budget they will be approving in late September.  I asked everyone to contact the Parks Department Director, Paul Dyer at 214/670-4100 and the City Council District #9 Councilman, Sheffie Kadane (City Council Member for Harry Stone) at 214/670-4069 to ask them to keep the Harry Stone Swimming Pool open.  Some Council Members will tell you that it is only for one year and it's to do renovations.  However, I have the official word from one of the Councilmembers that this simply isn't true.  What I was told was that some pools will close for one year while others will never open again and it's not to do renovations.  It's only to cut costs.  Lastly, I mentioned that the Casa View Baptist Church has now sold to a Hispanic group that wants to make the building into a church and hispanic school.  In order for them to add the school to their church, they will need a zoning change.  The zoning change is going to be heard and I haven't heard back from my contact as to when this hearing will be.  I'll keep you posted when I know more.  Lastly, I reminded everyone of the the Public Access and Active Call features at the Dallas Police web site.  For more detailed about an incident, go to the DPD web site and click on the "Public Access" icon on the main page.  To view all calls currently handled by 911 patrol, click on the "Active Calls" icon, located right next to the Public Access icon.  The calls on this page update every 2 minutes.

NEW PROGRAMS/NEW VARIOUS LAWS - There are several new things that were recently announced within the City of Dallas.

• NIXEL COMMUNITY INFORMATION  This is a Community Information Service provided by the Dallas Police.  Go to http://www.nixel.com to register.  Registration is free and totally secure.
• REVERSE 911   The City of Dallas has set up this program which will call any landline within the City Limits with any type of emergency that may be headed for your neighborhood.  You will only get alerts that apply to your area.  This program is also totally secure and registration is free.  If you would like your cell phone, TTY or VOIP phone registered, you need to go to the following link to register those types of phones.  No registration is needed for landline phones.  You will receive a call regarding you area's emergency even if you have a non-published telephone number.  To read more about this program, go to http://dallascityhall.com/oem/oem_reverse911.html.  I provided handouts about this service that were available after the meeting.
• NEW DAYTIME CURFEW   There is now a new Daytime Curfew in effect for anyone under the age of 17.  Kids of this age are not allowed out between the hours of 9:00 a.m. - 2:30 p.m., Monday through Friday, unless it can be verified that they have permission to be out.  Parents will be ticketed for any occurrence with each occurrence being counted and when it adds up to more than two times, the parents will receive a fine not less than $500, regardless if the two times were for one child or if they were for two different children.
• NEW ANIMAL LAWS LIMITING NUMBER OF ANIMALS   This new law went into effect the early part of 2009.  The rules for a single family residence is as follows.....No more than six dogs and/or cats are allowed at a home, with the total being the amount of animals inside the residence and outside, combined.  Fines are between $500-2,000 per day.
• INITIATE CULTIVATED ENHANCEMENTS   This is a new program I created for our individual needs after speaking with another crime watch chairman earlier this year.  Once they started their program, their crime went down 40% the first week.  All they did was to walk up and down the streets and alleys as a group and would pick-up trash if they saw it, or give someone a friendly reminder of a code violation thinking that the people either didn't know about it or had forgotten.  If this worked so well for them, I figured it would be worth a try.

CODE VIOLATION REMINDERS - I reminded everyone of a few of our code problems within the area.  1. I spoke about the loud boom boxes in cars and the loud speakers at neighborhood parties which are not allowed to be heard within 150 feet of a residence.  I'm sure many of you have heard both these types of loud speakers way past that amount of feet in the past and even late at night.  A typical lot which a home sits on in this neighborhood is 125 feet in length.  Think of how long your lot is from the front street to the middle of the back alley, then think of that going an additional 25 feet.  If you are hearing noise loud enough you can hear it and you are located past 150 feet, please report it immediately to 911.  2. Everyone is responsible to keep the alley behind their house clean and free of overhanging vines, shrubbery, etc.  3. People are not allowed to ride dirt bikes or mini-bikes on any surface except their own front yard, unless they are riding on a trail which has been set aside for the exclusive use of bicycles.  This does not include the walking trail around our park.  4. Bulky Trash - first Monday of each month.  If you are putting out your trash when the Monday of that week is not in the first of the month for the next month, then that is not our week.

Someone in the back of the room suggested setting up a sub-committee to recruit volunteers then asked for a show of hands to see if everyone agreed.  The people in the front of the room couldn't hear very well up there so they didn't understand what was being voted on.  Once the person asked for that vote twice, I spoke up and told everyone that we needed to hear from everyone to see what they wanted to do.  At that point, the majority raised their hands.  At this point, there was some people that kept interrupting, so I had to close the meeting without finishing the remainder of the topics on the agenda.  I will be discussing those at our next meeting.

As people were leaving the meeting, they were asked by a few of the people creating this committee to sign-up with them and one of them gave out their phone number to most everyone, from what I have heard.  I was told be several people that were in attendance that night that this actually created confusion in the long run (no one signed up on our volunteer sheet up front by me) because they thought that all sign-ups needed to be done with the new sub-committee, which I must have not made clear.  As of today, 9/5/09, I am learning more and more that several of the people that attended the meeting were confused as to what they were voting for and didn't correctly hear what it was.  I have also learned that there were three streets that did not receive a flyer about this meeting even though there was someone handing out those flyers and I had even called on the Sunday prior to the meeting to verify that they had been passed out and told them that I would get them passed out for them if they were now unable to do that.  I never received a call back.  One of those three streets has had more people at the crime watch meetings in the past than any street in our neighborhood.

Next time the meeting will be handled completely differently.  There has never been a problem with interruptions or anything like that at any or our past meetings and now that we have had this situation come up, I have learned what I need to do differently next time.  In the meantime, keep watching out for your neighbors, calling to report crime or code violations (anonymously if you choose), and speak with your neighbors even if it's only to tell them hello.  The more positive our area becomes will be the more this area will improve.  If there is anyone that needs to bring up something they would like discussed at our next meeting, please send me an e-mail at harrystone.crime@sbcglobal.net.

Cindy Green, Chairman  -   Harry Stone Crime Watch - HSCW 

Email us
harrystone.crime@sbcglobal.net