BEATRICE - Beatrice Police are in the initial stages of establishing a Community Watch program similar to neighborhood watch programs used across the U.S.


The coordinator of the effort, Officer Courtney Brauch, Interim Police Chief Jay Murphy and Captain Dan Moss met with a dozen residents Tuesday night, at the Beatrice School Administration building.
Brauch, a middle school resource officer with Beatrice Police…said Community Watch is about cooperation between citizens and police to address any concerns.


"You guys can help us being our eyes and our ears. You can see things that we normally don't see. We're out there patrolling the whole town of Beatrice...where people in your individual communities see things that may not stick out as odd or different, to us."


One part of the effort is establishing neighborhood structure, such as block captains who can meet with neighbors in an area….find out what concerns they have…and then communicate them to police.
"The purpose is for us to work together to keep Beatrice a safe place to live and keep it as safe as possible."


A Citizens Guide to Neighborhood Watch was distributed to those attending Tuesday night…offering information about recognizing and reporting criminal activity and security steps that can be taken, among other things.


"If it's not time-sensitive, the information can be brought to the police department...and we can sit and chat and talk about those issues. If it's something that is more time-sensitive...like, it's one in the morning and somebody's in my back yard.....that would be more of a calling the police department type of thing."


Brauch anticipates police would meet about every two months with block captains on neighborhood concerns. There is also a phone app available for neighborhoods…called Next Door App…. to communicate with police or for police to tell neighbors what to watch out for. Captain Dan Moss says he’s used it in his neighborhood.


"You can use it for whatever you want. If people lost a dog, or found a dog...they can post it on there and post pictures...they can say, hey, someone ran over my mailbox or someone drove through my yard....and this is about when it happened, did anybody see anything or did anyone have anything that may have recorded that. So, you can do a lot of that stuff."


Plans are to hold another meeting on Community Watch on May 22nd, at six p.m., at the School Administration building meeting room.