Obecians are stepping up to the plate following a call by one of their own to create a new Neighborhood Watch network encompassing OB and Point Loma.
\nSunset Cliffs resident Nicole Ueno recently began lobbying local residents, seeking their support on a proposal to create as many as eight different neighborhood watch “zones” across Ocean Beach and Point Loma.
\nThe movement is in part reacting to a recent major uptick in crime. Police responded to eight separate incidents of arson and vandalism \u2014 including people setting fire to alley debris, breaking car windows, even setting them ablaze \u2014 in OB in the month-long period between Dec. 7 and Jan. 7.\u00a0
\nSpearheaded by Ueno, 40-plus locals gathered Jan. 31 at the Ocean Beach Town Hall to discuss what can be done proactively to help prevent crime. Topics vetted included aggressive homeless panhandling, vandalism, tagging, arson and illegal camps.
\nWhat came out of that Jan. 31 meeting, was a proposal to form new Neighborhood Watch groups in both OB and Point Loma with several different zones.
\nA Facebook page has also been created to popularize and promote the Neighborhood Watch effort.
\nAsked why she\u2019s creating new Neighborhood Watch groups, Ueno replied, “Just the overall increase in crime in the area, [growing] trespassing incidents by solicitors getting into people\u2019s homes \u2014 it goes back a few years.”
\nUeno described the initial reaction she\u2019s received from Peninsula residents to her efforts as “a huge outpouring of support from all sides.”
\nUeno said her plan for OB is to extend the concept of the Neighborhood Watches, “So that you have members spread throughout each of the zones. We\u2019re working now on setting up the zones, and getting neighbors to participate on their block, or in their zone.”
\nAsked about the progress of her efforts, Ueno answered, “It already seems to be happening seamlessly.” She added her goal is to have the new network up and running by the end of February.
\n“We want to have all our telephone trees and messenger groups intact by then,” Ueno said. “We need to set up zones, and captains for those zones. We\u2019ll have a meeting where we can all get to know each other.”
\nUeno said her reasons for spearheading Neighborhood Watch groups goes beyond the recent crime spurt.
\n“People don\u2019t feel safe in their community,” she concluded. “We are trying to activate, and engage, people to take some action to change that.”
\nUeno said her Neighborhood Watch initiative is seeking other improvements from the city for beach communities.
\n“We\u2019re petitioning the city for more street lights to be installed in OB, which is very dark at night,” she said. “We also want to put together a self-defense class for women. We also want to set up first aid and CPR certification classes to train people what to do in the event of medical emergencies. We also want to put together a self-defense class for women.”
\nSetting up a Neighborhood Watch will also involve introducing new signage to alert citizens, and warn criminals, that a citizen\u2019s anti-crime network is functioning.
\nUeno said, as of mid-February, nearly 900 people had signed on to the new Neighborhood Watch program via the community\u2019s Facebook page.
\n“We\u2019re all working together, sharing ideas,” Ueno said of the ongoing effort.
\nPreviously, Ueno, a lifelong Obecian, said she was “lucky to have grown up in such a beautiful and unique place.” But, she added, crime and rude behavior in OB has grown to the point where “I\u2019m afraid to walk at night, or of getting yelled at for not handing out cigarettes or money, or stepping on broken glass on Newport Avenue where I used to walk barefoot in the summer. There\u2019s no way I\u2019d let my kids do that today.”\u00a0<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Obecians are stepping up to the plate following a call by one of their own to create a new Neighborhood Watch network encompassing OB and Point Loma. Sunset Cliffs resident Nicole Ueno recently began lobbying local residents, seeking their support on a proposal to create as many as eight different neighborhood watch “zones” across Ocean […]<\/p>","protected":false},"author":726,"featured_media":268506,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"11561","_seopress_titles_title":"Peninsulans band together to start new Neighborhood Watch for Ocean Beach and Point Loma","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"jnews_override_counter":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[11551,11561],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-268505","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","category-peninsula-beacon"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/268505","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/726"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=268505"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/268505\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/268506"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=268505"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=268505"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=268505"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}