RECENT COMMENTS

Follow-up from First Precinct Community Training Day

Following up on plans from April’s Police Sector Training, a walk-through of part of Fulton Hill is planned for July 16. The invite says that “it will be particularly valuable to have the Church Hill Community come and give us their objective impressions and recommendations based on their experiences”.

From a forwarded July 8 email from Zeb Gray:

Hi Neighbors and Community Members,

One of the action plans that came out of the April
Police Sector Training was to conduct a “walk through”
of a problem area in our community. Church Hill and
Greater Fulton teamed up at that meeting and both
constituencies identified youth behavior as the
primary problem. The 5000 block of Government Road
was a leader in police response calls as the major
area of concern followed by our concern of the
Powhatan Park area west of Government off of
Williamsburg Road.

I coordinated with Officer Sarah Cambell of the RPD to
conduct the ’07 walk through. We chose Monday July 16
at 6:30 PM to stage this exercise.

I see several positive outcomes from this event. They
include at minimum:
* the opportunity for community building
* a means of brainstorming issues and solutions
* a show of “solidarity” to the community in crime
prevention
* an opportunity for RPD to recommend actions and hear
concerns

Richmond Police Department has offered to join us on
this walk. We will begin our walk just North of the
Williamsburg/Government Road intersection near the
Fulton Hill garden by the Chinese restaurant. We’ll
travel west to Powhatan Park and the Community Center.
Then we’ll head back via a different route to return
to our starting points. This is about a one mile
loop. For folks that can’t walk that far we’ll
organize a car pool. We’ll conduct a short debrief at
the end and the whole event should be wrapped up by
7:45 PM.

Please consider participating. The potential benefits
are too valuable for us not pursue this with a strong
turn-out. It will be particularly valuable to have
the Church Hill Community come and give us their
objective impressions and recommendations based on
their experiences.

Let me know if you can or cannot come so I can be sure
to have enough water and Gatorade available. Please
call your neighbors and invite them out too. (Church
Hill folks please forward this invitation to your
community stakeholders and encourage them to come).

Until then, call me if you have any questions
(308-2560). Bring your camera and let’s have fun!

Stay cool,

Zeb Gray