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AT WORK: Neighborhood fights crime
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Published: May 10, 2008
ASHEVILLE
Nobody told Allison Browne what to expect when she bought her home in the South French Broad Avenue neighborhood two summers ago.
She didn't picture prostitutes standing in front of her house on Bartlett Street every day to meet customers behind a nearby church while her 5-year-old daughter played on the sidewalk.
Nor did she imagine finding people openly selling drugs in the neighborhood park.
But she isn't leaving. Browne and a group of neighbors have taken action, helping police crack down on illegal activity and calling on residents to keep a watchful eye.
The South French Broad Neighborhood Association has a clear message for criminals.
"We're showing that we have no patience for it anymore. It's not OK," said Browne, who moved to Asheville from Minneapolis.
Although crime continues, with reports of a rape and armed robberies nearby in recent weeks, residents say they've seen their streets change for the better in a short time.
Older residents remember a time when the South French Broad community was one of the finest in Asheville. Civic leaders and business owners maintained their homes and lawns and made friends with the people next door.
But as one generation passed away or sold their property, the area changed. Careless tenants moved in, starting less-than-reputable businesses. Break-ins increased. People started locking their doors. That's how longtime home-owner Rosa Weaver Walker remembers it. Walker, 87, said that her once-safe neighborhood became overrun with pimps, prostitutes and drug dealers. One day she had to call the police because a woman had passed out in her front yard.
"My children would come home, and I would tell them, ‘Don't you go by yourself. Someone (needs to) go with you if you visit a neighbor,'" Walker said. "It was just so sad to lose a neighborhood like that," she said.
Browne said that when her family moved to Asheville, they found a sense of hopelessness among some residents who thought the city wasn't paying attention to their neighborhood.
That didn't keep Browne and her husband from calling police constantly and writing letters to the Asheville City Council.
Their efforts and those of like-minded neighbors resulted in the city organizing a community meeting last summer at the local Brown Temple church to deal with neighborhood problems. About 100 people attended.
Afterward, residents threw a community barbecue to help neighbors get to know each other. From that gathering, the neighborhood association formed.
A community-resource officer from the Asheville Police Department comes to their monthly meetings to listen to concerns, and officers also help with neighborhood-cleanup days and other activities.
The strong relationship that has formed between community resource officer Jackie Stepp and residents has helped police fight crime in the area more effectively.
"They know more than we know about what's going on in their community. They see the problems more than we see the problems," Stepp said.
"Nobody's going to pick up a prostitute in front of a police car. They're the ones that see it, and they can relay that information," she said.
Browne said that Stepp is always available to residents to deal with small and large problems in the neighborhood.
Walker said that at one time she and others were afraid to report crimes. But once people in the neighborhood started meeting to voice their concerns to police, their spirit changed.
"We were really afraid, but once we're organized, we got the gist of it, we knew how to operate," Walker said.
Asheville police have made a concentrated effort in recent months to fight prostitution in the neighborhood.
The neighborhood association has been supportive of their work, specifically an Internet prostitution blotter that city police rolled out in February.
The Web site displays names and photos of alleged prostitutes and their alleged customers caught during police sting operations on South French Broad and nearby areas.
Police also send cards to people whose vehicles are seen frequently driving around the neighborhood.
The tactics spurred objections from such groups as the American Civil Liberties Union, which recently sent a letter to the city of Asheville questioning whether the blotter is constitutional.
But Walker said it has been effective at putting extra heat on prostitutes and their customers, causing many to leave the neighborhood. She said that many pimps and drug dealers seemed to leave the area within days of media reports about the crime blotter.
Arrests for prostitution in the area increased from one in the first quarter of 2006 to eight during the same months this year, according to police records. Drug arrests did not vary significantly during this period.
Prostitution has visibly dropped since the sting operation, Stepp said.
Browne said she wants to see the local community begin adopting programs to specifically help the women involved in prostitution.
Though crime has not ceased, Browne said walking down French Broad Avenue feels different this spring from the same time last year. She knows if the community stops being vigilant in organizing and calling police, the criminals would probably return quickly.
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Thursday's relish stories will appear in the Entertainment section.
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