Lt. Bob Hancock, with the Bradley County Sheriff’s Office, chats with Zachery Gallegos, a high school student who talked his neighbors into forming their own Neighborhood Watch group.AT A GLANCEHow to organize a Neighborhood Watch:• Determine if there is neighborhood interest.• Call the sheriff’s office or your local police department for advice. In Bradley County, 728-7311 for Lt. Bob Hancock• Schedule a meeting time and place.• To be certified by the sheriff’s department, have at least one meeting a year.Source: Bradley County Sheriff’s Department
CLEVELAND, Tenn. — Inspired by his high school criminal justice class, Zachery Gallegos asked his neighbors in a developing subdivision to form a Neighborhood Watch program.
“Once we started talking about speeders and how little kids could get hurt, people said OK,” the teen said.
So Thursday evening the Silver Springs subdivision, a new community off Old Freewill Road, became Bradley County’s 39th Neighborhood Watch group.
“This program is for everybody,” Lt. Bob Hancock of the Bradley County Sheriff’s Office said before meeting with the group. “It is for affluent neighborhoods, apartment complexes, trailer parks, anyone.”