Anchorage Police Chief Justin Doll says while there is a spike in stolen cars this year, his team is striving to recover them and finding success.
Numbers presented to Assembly members during Wednesday’s public safety committee meeting cite that so far this year, 92 percent of stolen cars have been recovered, with an average of $193 worth of damage to returned vehicles.
Chief Doll says a common question from the public is what’s being done with stolen cars.
“Typically what we’re seeing is that they’re being used to commit other crimes,” he said. “A method of transport to and from the scene of the other crime.”
He says people who drive stolen cars tend to speed away quickly from police, which can sometimes be a hard balance for officers when trying to recover a vehicle in a safe manner. He suggests the first thing any victim of a car theft is to call police.
“Taking that kind of positive action on your own typically can be problematic for residents and we don’t want them to be injured in the course of trying to recover property,” he said. “No one’s safety is worth their property, so, we recommend they call us.”
Another focus during the committee meeting dealt with calls for service in Fairview. This year, there have been more than 300 assault calls and more than 100 robbery calls.
Within the 1000 square-foot area near Bean’s Cafe and Brother Francis Shelter, through June 5 of this year, police have documented 88 assault calls in that vicinity. Twenty-seven percent of assaults happened outside of the two centers, with nearly half of them involving a use of a weapon.
“Everyone is concerned and ready to roll up our sleeves and work on this issue,” Lisa Caldeira, program manager at Brother Francis Shelter, said. “The issue of how to keep people safe and that’s everyone– from the clients here at Brother Francis Shelter and Bean’s Cafe– to those who are just gravitating to this area, to the business owners, to the neighbors, to those who are just driving through.”
Caldeira said the shelter remains in constant contact with police over those issues. She emphasized their focus on a long-term goal of getting clients into permanent housing.
Bean’s Cafe executive director Lisa Sauder said they continue to work to get people into their centers to be safe.
“We’ve posted signs,” she said. “We’re talking to people in our client services office, really just encouraging people to come in and use the shelter system.”
Fire officials said making the drug “Spice” illegal likely led to a decrease in suspected spice transports documented after the height of the epidemic in 2015.
But, Sauder says, she still sees the need for more resources to combat the problem and officials did say they’ve seen a small rise this year.
“In the last couple of weeks and the last couple of days especially, we have seen increased episodes of people having adverse reactions to spice,” she said.
Assembly member Christopher Constant, who represents the Fairview area, called the statistics “sad and frustrating.”
Constant said he wishes this community could feel more like home for everyone.
“I do have friends coming out and saying we think we need to move out of the neighborhood,” Constant explained.
But he remains hopeful there can be a unified response to turn things around.
“Let’s fix this problem,” he said. “We can do it.”
The post APD, AFD provide latest crime rates appeared first on KTVA 11.
