NEWS

Community watch group exceeds 100 members

Spencer Remoquillo
Reporter

LANCASTER – Local law enforcement now has 102 extra sets of eyes and ears patrolling Fairfield County.

Thirty-five people graduated from the Fairfield County Sheriff’s Office’s Community Watch Training Academy this week, adding between 10 and 12 more patrol members each to Lancaster, Violet Township and the Canal Winchester watch substation.

Sgt. Jesse Hendershot said this is the largest graduating class that the sheriff’s office has seen since watch’s inception about eight years ago.

The first year the community watch started, in 2007, there were 34 graduates, and Hendershot said numbers dwindled from there, averaging about 10 new members each year.

With the use of social media and newspaper publicity, Hendershot said, more people heard about the program and wanted to get involved this year.

“We hit media with press releases, we hit social media and sent emails,” he said. “I think it was a network of everybody.”

Hendershot expected that the new graduates would be split evenly among the group’s watch areas. Lancaster has about 40 watch group members, and there are a total of 102 trained members using six community watch vehicles, typically patrolling on four-hour shifts.

“They’re basically an extra set of eyes and ears to the sheriff’s office,” Hendershot said, explaining that they do not take reports or make arrests but help deter crime just by their presence.

“We have a lot of burglaries during the day, so it’s nice just to have that car driving around,” he added.

The volunteer members patrol using community watch-issued vehicles that display the watch logo and colors, which Hendershot said people often can’t differentiate from a deputy’s cruiser.

“People suddenly start obeying the traffic laws when they see us,” said community watch Capt. Gary Bush, who leads the Canal Winchester substation.

About two weeks ago, Bush was out patrolling with another member when they found a snow-covered vehicle reported stolen out of Lancaster sitting near Rockmill Park.

“Those are the kind of the things that can happen,” Bush said. “You stumble across something and it looks out of place and you call it in.”

This is one example, Hendershot said, of how watch members can help. He said they also assist in vehicle lockouts when deputies are busy on other calls.

Though this group of new members graduated from basic training, Hendershot said, training is ongoing and scheduled monthly for the group. Training includes patrolling techniques, first aid and CPR, and drug recognition, among other classes.

“Our job is to observe and report. ... That’s our mantra, and we could always use more people to fill up those vehicles,” Bush said.

sroush@lancastereaglegazette.com

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Twitter: @SpencerRoushLEG