Community Policing and Crime Reporting

Police administrators and government officials have agreed that traditional policing strategies cannot reduce the high crime rates in urban and nonurban areas. Thus, police administrations have suggested new policing strategies that would involve community residents in order to reduce crime rates in their neighborhoods. According to many police administrators, communities should be more involved and actively engaged with in the solution of problems within their neighborhoods. In addition, with the help of the government funds, community policing strategy has gained much attention from both the public and the police arenas. However, this new phenomenon has mostly been implemented in urban police departments. Considering that there are also many people who live outside the cities and downtown areas, community policing activities should be conducted by police agencies in nonurban areas. Although many police agencies in rural areas and small towns claim they have long been conducting activities related to community policing, there is a large gap in the literature regarding the implementation of community policing in nonurban areas.