Pubdate: Thu, 28 Sep 2006 Source: Plain Dealer, The (Cleveland, OH) Copyright: 2006 The Plain Dealer Contact: http://www.cleveland.com/plaindealer/ Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/342 Note: priority given to local letter writers Author: John P. Coyne, Plain Dealer Reporter ACROSS THE CITY, WAR ON CRIME IS RALLYING CRY Cleveland Residents, Officials Act To Save Neighborhoods Judy Novak considers the neighborhood she lives in on Cleveland's West Side a great location -- just a mile from Lake Erie and a few blocks from the Lakewood border. But she's concerned about her safety. Novak, 40, and her husband, Brian Egizii, 37, moved into the area 10 years ago. Lately, however, the neighborhood has changed. They and their neighbors see more drug dealers and prostitutes on the street. They say the lawbreakers are tarnishing the neighborhood. Something had to be done, Novak decided. She started writing down license numbers and turning them over to police. The couple even let a detective use their roof to observe the drug sales. Their assistance resulted in several arrests. Like the Novaks, more and more Clevelanders on both sides of town seem to worry about becoming crime victims. As Cleveland's population continues to dwindle while the violence increases, city officials and residents are realizing that the crime problem may be too much for police alone to handle. Novak and more than 100 other residents of Cleveland's Cudell and Edgewater communities assembled on a warm night last month outside Our Father's House, a church on Detroit Avenue, near West 112th Street. The church is just a mile from where Cleveland Detective Jonathan "A.J." Schroeder was fatally shot in late August. "Put a stop to drugs, murder, evil, hate" read a leaflet that Pastor C.E. Patterson had circulated to notify area residents of his community meeting. The 70-year-old pastor stood on the front steps of the church and in sermon-like tones warned residents that unless they united to fight the threat, thugs would take over the neighborhood. "Drug dealers, pimps and prostitutes can be changed," Patterson told the group. "Let's unite. Stop the blight and communicate." Sixty-one people signed up to be crime-fighting volunteers that night. For the 22,000 people living in the Cudell-Edgewater community, even nonviolent crimes, such as car break-ins, create a fear that causes residents to limit their activities, especially at night. "You cannot leave anything outside," one resident of West 112th Street warned. "It'll be gone in a minute." Thieves will grab anything they can turn into quick cash. Lt. Douglas Dvorak calls the crime problem - drug dealing, prostitution, thefts - "quality of life" issues. He supervises eight 1st District detectives who focus on ridding the community of people who degrade neighborhoods with their criminal behavior. "A lot of police are frustrated with these criminals," Dvorak said. The drug peddlers attract people who are drug dependent - those who steal whatever they can get their hands on to feed their habit, or women who sell their bodies for drug money. What's worse, he said, is that they are becoming more violent and many of them carry weapons. Cleveland's population is declining for two reasons - schools and crime, said Councilman Zachary Reed of the Mount Pleasant neighborhood. Reed said he is hoping surveillance cameras can help curtail criminal activity in his ward, among the most violent in the city. Cameras already installed have reduced crime in some neighborhoods by 73 percent, he said. He plans to use federal grants to buy more cameras and uses grant money to pay off-duty police officers to patrol streets in his ward. The councilman also has declared war on graffiti by quickly getting rid of it. "If you let graffiti stay up, it buys into the perception that it's a bad neighborhood," he said. In Collinwood, Councilman Mike Polensek has started a program using what he calls a Misery Index to target lawbreakers. "We're sending hate letters to the individuals who have been arrested, telling them that we are putting them on notice," Polensek said. "The level of criminal activity and drug-related activity has risen from one end of town to the other," he said. "In some cases it's driving small businesses out and it's driving homeowners out. We have got to draw the line. . . . Their behavior . . . is unacceptable and I don't want them in my neighborhood." Councilman Tony Brancatelli, who represents residents in Slavic Village, said crime is their No. 1 complaint. As a result, he has hired a retired police lieutenant to keep track of where the crime is occurring and off-duty police to walk beats in the commercial district. A common complaint from people throughout Cleveland is that landlords do not do enough to screen tenants. Polensek plans to pressure landlords to get rid of bad tenants. If the offender lives in subsidized housing, he will ask housing officials to evict that person. Judy Novak said she continues to see drug activity at a 19-suite apartment building near her West Side home. She said the building's landlord promised to do background checks on new tenants to weed out troublemakers, but things have not changed. The landlord, Isabella Barna, 62, said that if she eliminated all but perfect tenants, the building would have an 80 percent vacancy rate. Citing her mortgage and $10,000-a-year heating bill, she said she cannot afford to run an apartment building without tenants. Novak said she is afraid whenever she has to be away from home that it will be broken into. Yet, she said she loves the neighborhood and wants to stay. Some officials who deal with crime problems daily say that residents' fears may be exaggerated. Birgit Hilliard, crime prevention program manager for the nonprofit Cudell Improvement Inc., knows that some residents are scared, but she assures them that the city and her organization are working to improve safety in the neighborhood. "I spend a lot of time observing faces," she said. "I talk to a lot of people. . . We get names [of suspects] and see if we have anything on them." Hilliard, who works closely with City Council members, keeps a spreadsheet showing all crimes reported in the neighborhood for the last three years and the names of arrested suspects. She sets up Block Watch groups and phone chains to help keep residents informed and reassures crime victims that people in the community care. She gives her crime observations to 1st District detectives and four off-duty police officers hired to walk beats along the area's main thoroughfares. Merchants pay a monthly fee for the extra protection. - --- MAP posted-by: Beth Wehrman