April 10, 2010 Meeting Summary
East Eaton Wash Neighborhood Association
Preparation
E-mail reminder was sent.
Attendees
5 members
Meeting
Agenda Items:
The meeting began around 11:25 am
- Summary of Police community meeting for Council District 4
- This meeting took place at Pasadena High School on March 25.
There were lots of police officers and explorers there. Turnout
of citizens was more then most community meetings, but not a large
number.
- Lt Tom Delgado was introduced. A 27 year veteran, he is
the fairly new watch commander for the police department's East Service
Area. That is an area which is basically east of Altadena Drive.
- The police chief and other top level officers also spoke.
- They described how they have recently changed policy to make
patrol a priority and to try to keep each officer serving the same
neighborhood for at least a year.
- They have changed the schedules so each officer works patrol three days a week for 12 hours a day. That
leaves 10 hours a month for use in training and community
outreach. Training as part of the regular schedule will save on
overtime. But they say the overtime funds saved will be
reinvested back into having officers work on particular problems in
their service area.
- They
introduced about 12 officers currently working the
area. There are about 18 total. At any given time there are
now twoor three officers on duty for the area. The slow time is 2
am to 7 am. There are two additional city wide teams plus
detectives.
- They
showed statistics that crime is down in Pasadena over
recent years, except burglary is up 9%. Also Pasadena solves
crimes at a higher rate then the national average, except for
burglaries. This was attributed to detectives being given the
resources to solve crimes. In this area the crime rate is low
compared to many other parts of Pasadena. Burglary is the worse
problem.
- There
have been a lot of auto thefts and burglaries in recent
months. The police are reminding everyone to not leave anything
visible of value (or that looks like it could have value or be hiding
something) in their car. And to lock it, and set the alarm (if you
have one). And report any crimes or suspicious activities
immediately.
- As
for burglaries, it was noted that if you are home when
someone rings your bell or knocks on your door, even if you have no
intention of talking to them you should make noise they can hear so
they know someone is home and not think it is a good target for
burglary. They
also suggest not opening the door to anyone you don't know or aren't
expecting. And call the police about anyone that seems suspicious.
- In response to questions, they said to call them about people
going through the trash. Raiding the recycle bins is a
crime. They won't always be able to come, but will if they can.
- There
has been increasing incidents of mail and deliveries
being stolen. Get a locking box and put outgoing mail in official
postal boxes. If there is a theft, they said to report it to
Pasadena Police as well as postmaster - that PPD has more capacity to
investigate because the postmaster is completely overwhelmed.
Also if you find opened packages where they shouldn't be, don't touch
them and call the police.
- Recommended programming the Pasadena PD non-emergency phone number 626 744-4241 into
your cell phone. Said that it is often much faster to call it
even in an emergency because 911 dialed from cell phones goes to the
statewide CHP response and they are totally overwhelmed. The
Pasadena PD dispatcher will re-direct your call to the appropriate
agency if needed.
- They
said prostitution in East Pasadena (eg Colorado Blvd) is much
reduced. Special enforcement section has been aggressively
enforcing. Just 6 calls in last 3 months.
- They
talked about their e-policing initiative. They are
hoping to provide more timely and accurate information to the public
then what typically occurs with rumors. Reports to state and FBI
are only once a month and only for "part 1 crimes". Data on
service calls are being uploaded to crimemapping.com every day.
For privacy reasons, the crimemapping.com location data is offset by
40' on the street and only localized to the nearest 100
block. There was concern expressed by an East Colorado
hotel owner that people might see crime icons nearby and not think the
area is safe.
- Anyone
interested in setting up a Neighborhood Watch program for their
immediate neighborhood (usually a block at most) is encouraged to
contact police specialist Laura Morris at 626 744-7657.
- PLEAS Emergency Notification System Registration
- PLEAS stands for Pasadena Local Emergency Alert System.
- It
will automatically call all households and businesses within specific
areas during or after a disaster or emergency. PLEAS messages are
emergency notifications or time-critical safety alerts.
- PLEAS is
part of disaster response and is not related to NIXLE (which is more for press releases).
- The Pasadena Fire Department is requesting that people "self-register" their contact information with the PLEAS system.
- The city already has traditional land line phone numbers in the
PLEAS system, but you have to self-register cell phone numbers,
voice-over-internet phone numbers, and e-mail addresses.
- Detailed information and links to self-registration can be found here: http://cityofpasadena.net/Fire/PLEAS
- The self registration form requires input of at least name,
address, at least one phone number, and at least one e-mail address. It
says the e-mail address becomes an account login user
name. (Apparently you are setting up an online account where you
can log in and change your information in the future.) You can
checkmark on a list of notification types: Fire Alerts, Police
ResidentialAlerts, Police Business Alerts, Public Health Alerts,
Unplanned Utility Outage Alerts, Red Flag Parking Restrictions.
- They
are also asking you to put the phone number (626) 405-2358 into phone
contact lists so you will recognize when you are getting a call from
PLEAS.
And the e-mail address PasadenaLocalAlert@cityofpasadena.net into
address books so its messages won't be filtered out as spam.
- When
it has a notification to deliver, the system is supposed
to "know whether or not the message has been delivered to a person,
recorded to voicemail, or was not delivered due to a telephone system
error. The system will continue to attempt to deliver its message
until the message is successfully delivered to a person, or until the
message expires." To believe that you got the message, it
requires you to answer the phone, say "Hello", press a numeric key,
listen to the entire message, follow any instructions, and wait for it
to say "Goodbye".
- They are also recommending registering with LA County's similar system at http://alert.lacounty.gov
- Alameda speed hump installation delayed
- Our neighbor Kim says she has been told that the city "ran out of
money" and therefore installation of the speed humps on Alameda will be
delayed until sometime after they solicit bids and approve a contract
forthe next fiscal year starting in July.
- Property of former strip club on East Foothill sold
- According to a blog article published online by the LA Times
- The
property that used to be a strip club at 3570-72 Foothill Blvd (across
the street from Ralphs shopping center) has been sold to "a real estate
investment firm based in Pasadena and controlled by
Pasadena businessman Steve Schultz".
- It
says he owns many other commercial properties in Pasadena and hopes to
convert the building into medical or other offices or possibly a store.
- City proposing to lease land at Sierra Madre and Washington Blvds?
- The
City Council is meeting with County Supervisor Michael Antonovitch on
April 15 and one of the agenda items is described by the weekly
Neighborhood Connections community e-mail as follows:
- proposed lease of county land at Washington Boulevard and Sierra
Madre Boulevard to expand local community recreation facilities and increase
access to quality, affordable, youth-oriented recreational opportunities, as
well as proposed development of new multipurpose fields
- No additional information has been made available yet.
- anything else attendees wish to discuss
- utility discount for low income users
- One of our seniors reported she now receives a significant and very
helpful discount on her Pasadena Water and Power bill.
She said the process was easy and recommends it to those who qualify.
She called the number on an insert in a recent bill, made an
appointment, and then took the documentation they requested with her.
- The qualifying income levels were raised last year. There is
also a non-income qualified discount for users of electricity hog
medical equipment.
- See the PWP web page for details: http://www.cityofpasadena.net/waterandpower/WeCanHelp/default.asp
Next meeting is May 8, 2010, 11:15 am, at Hastings Branch Library
Adjourned about 12:30 pm