Fayetteville Today

Police can’t be everywhere all the time, so it takes more of a community effort to prevent crime.

That’s the working theory behind the City of Fayetteville justifying a program to award micro-grants to community members who come up with viable suggestions to reduce the occurrence of crime—especially violent crime—in their neighborhoods.

"What the micro-grants enables the public or our community to do is bring those ideas to impact what they think will make a difference to minimize crime, specifically violent crime in certain areas within our community,” Fayetteville Police Chief Gina Hawkins said in a recent WRAL report. 

The City has set aside $5,000 and has been receiving applications for part of that money. Private citizens and community organizations are eligible to toss their suggestions into the ring.

The deadline to apply for this year’s distribution was Sunday, but the funding is set up for two years, with the next application cycle opening in October.

It’s a plan that has already sparked some good ideas throughout the city.

"I've heard community groups talking about how they can expand their national night out, how they could attract new community watch members in their neighborhood,” said Albert Baker, who is charged with allocating cash awards from the $5,000 pool of money when good ideas come in.

It also plants the seed of how important community involvement is when it comes to improving the quality of life in neighborhoods.

"It is the community's responsibility to share how do we want to keep our community safe,” Hawkins said.

City leaders are hoping that by getting people more active with neighborhood watch programs or other alternatives that are suggested, Fayetteville can start reducing the likelihood of dealing with an increase in violent crime.