For over thirty years law enforcers and their civilian partners have been working together to reduce crime and improve the quality of life in neighborhoods around the country. Today with continued emphasis on crime reduction and the added task of fighting the war on terrorism, Neighborhood Watch is more important than ever. Throughout the country citizens are being empowered and mobilized as they participate in proactive partnerships with their local law enforcement agencies.

Traditionally a Neighborhhood Watch group is led by a community member who is actively involved and dedicated to the program. Often these group leaders are selected because of their previous crime prevention experience and training or because of their interest in the program. Some Neighborhood Watch leaders are chosen because of their desire to reach out to and work with the community, while others were selected because of their communication skills or abilities to plan, organize and mobilize others.

The Carteret County Sheriff’s Office offers a Neighborhood Watch Toolkit which is comprised of self-paced learning curricula and community based presentations with supplemental action-oriented Neighborhood Watch tools. The training is designed to enhance local efforts by highlighting important Neighborhood Watch topics such as recruitment of volunteers, managing meetings, target hardening for homes, observation skills and reporting of suspicious activities.

The game plan is to guide you from the initial introduction to Neighborhood Watch all the way through working with established groups as they expand the scope of their local activities and partner with other citizen-based organizations such as Citizen Corps.