Purpose

Founded: November 1996

Purpose
To promote neighborhood safety by patrolling the community and contacting the police or proper authorities when action is required.

To assess community problems through the use of problem-solving techniques.

Our History

On November 16, 1996, the Clearing Night Force Watch Group began the weekly patrols of our neighborhood's streets, alleys, and parks in CAPS Beat 812 (60th – 65th, Harlem – Central). The founding members of our watch group believed that every community goes through good and bad changes. As concerned residents, we realized that we must never take our neighborhood environment for granted.  We believe that all community members must become vigilant and proactive in helping maintain a safe, secure, and clean neighborhood.

As volunteers on patrol, we are watchful for suspicious activity that may warrant police attention by calling 911.  We document city services that need attention submitting them weekly to our 13th & 23rd Aldermanic offices.  We communicate with our beat officers to share information about things that concern our safety in our community. We pay special attention to the parks, and schools' areas of concern brought up at our CAPS Beat 812 meeting.  

Each member of our volunteer group usually gives one day/evening per month to patrol.  We assist the police by being additional “eyes and ears”. We patrol with a partner cruising up and down the streets and alleys, around parks, taking note of the suspicious activity, graffiti, potholes, abandoned vehicles, street/alley light outages, garbage carts without lids, overgrown weeds, etc.  We support our police and victims of crimes by attending court cases relevant to Beat 812 through the 008th District's Court Advocacy program.   

Over the past 28 years as an organized watch group, we have submitted thousands of city services for attention.  This may seem insignificant to some, but if you travel through other neighborhoods throughout the city that are plagued with graffiti, abandoned houses, potholes, garbage on the streets, and alley/street light outages, you probably feel unsafe as you travel through that area. You may also notice that there aren’t drug dealers/gang members hanging out on our corners or in front of an abandoned house. There may be abandoned houses in our neighborhood because of the downturn in the economy; they are not open and unsecured.   We won’t allow that to occur in our community!