Public Safety

We are fortunate in Hot Springs to have a highly-trained professional police force serving our community.  Our frontline officers are called upon to do many different tasks--helping accident victims, providing first aid until medical help arrives on scene, mitigating domestic disputes, aiding those with substance abuse issues, as well as protecting our community from acts of violent crime.  It is an exceedingly challenging and stressful job.

Our police officers need to know the District One City Director has their back.  I will always be an advocate for our frontline officers.  By way of contrast, current City Director, Erin Holliday, recently wanted to deny our police officers a cost-of-living pay increase.  Fortunately, the six other members of the Board of Directors understood the folly in Holliday’s proposal and rejected it outright.  Even more galling for our police officers, while Holliday wanted to deny our officers a 3% cost-of-living raise (approximately $125 per month for newly hired officers), Holliday had no difficulty voting to approve a $16,000 end-of-year bonus for the City Manager.

While our police officers do an admirable job, public safety does not rest solely with the police.  Safe communities are made by neighbor helping neighbor and working together to address problems and issues.  District One's Park Avenue Community has shown one way to reduce crime: bring residents together with police and nuisance abatement to raze blighted structures before problems fester.  Starting in 2002, the city began closing down multiple crime-ridden and unsafe residential motels in the neighborhood.  At the same time, the city understood the need to reinvest in the Park Avenue Community.  Listening to and partnering with nearby residents, the city created David Watkins' Memorial Park.  What had once been a troublesome residential motel is now an urban oasis with a playground, an amphitheater and green space.  The city, again listening to area residents, also invested in sidewalk and roadway enhancements along Park Avenue.  And there has been a spillover effect.  Nearby private property owners have taken to improving their properties.

In my own neighborhood, we brought residents together with city officials to promote neighborhood watch efforts and the installation of private homeowner security cameras.  Such cameras have been invaluable in identifying and apprehending offenders.  Recently an individual vandalized several properties in the Whittington Valley.  Working together, an alert was sent out and the individual was caught on several security cameras.  Photos were forwarded to the police and the vandal was identified and is currently in jail.  Ultimately, enhancing public safety is about finding the best solution for each community.  And it starts by bringing together residents, city departments and the police to develop and enact comprehensive community-based solutions.

Public safety goes beyond law enforcement.  It includes issues such as improving pedestrian and cyclist safety.  According to information provided by the Hot Springs Police Department, there have been over forty pedestrian-vehicle accidents since the start of the year.  Seventy-five percent of those accidents have occurred on a state highway (remember that Central Avenue, Park Avenue, Grand Avenue, Albert Pike, Higden Ferry and Airport Road are all state highways).   Solving this problem requires all of us to work together.   Pedestrians and drivers need to be vigilant.  All too often pedestrians do not use crosswalks or cross in the middle of the road (rather than at intersections).  Drivers can be distracted, or even worse, careless.  In my own neighborhood, a federal grant and city funds have paid for sidewalk repairs, the installation of marked crosswalks and bike lanes, new bump-outs and distinctive road markings to enhance pedestrian and cyclist safety.  Similar work has been completed along Park Avenue.  The City has adopted a policy of spending 20% of its annual paving budget on building "Complete Street" improvements, such as sidewalks, crosswalks, bike lanes, and other similar safety enhancements.  However, even with such a financial commitment, the need far outstrips available funding.

Unfortunately, the city has no ability to make wholesale changes to the state highways that run through our city.  Rather, the Arkansas Department of Transportation (ARDoT) oversees these roadways.  And with 75% of pedestrian accidents occurring on these roads, the City can only suggest safety improvements.  Any modifications to the roadway have to be approved by ARDoT--which can be an exceedingly slow process.   Years ago, I was told by an ARDoT employee that citizen complaints, especially in the form of written letters to the Director of ARDoT can have an outsized impact and bring an issue to the forefront in the Department.  I have written such letters and encourage others to do the same.   At the same time, our police officers are stepping up enforcement efforts, issuing warnings and, when need, writing citations to drivers who fail to yield to pedestrians at crosswalks.  Ultimately, everyone—drivers, pedestrians, the city, ArDoT and the police—will need to work together to reduce pedestrian-vehicle accidents in our city.