East Coast Radio fights crime online

The newly launched internet-based virtual notice board, Neighbourhood Watch, is an offshoot from East Coast Radio's popular Crimewatch on-air feature and Blog. Recognised as a crime fighter for many years, incidents reported by East Coast Radio were recently raised in Parliament.

It's hoped that Neighbourhood Watch will enable East Coast Radio to take its crime fighting initiatives to new levels. After registering on the site, web users are able to report and track crime and suspicious behaviour in their areas. There is no cost involved in the registration.

Apart from assisting the public, Neighbourhood Watch will also act as a resource for Community Policing Forums, private security companies, the South African Police Services or anyone else who wishes to access real-time information about crime in communities throughout KZN.

What makes the initiative unique is that listeners are able to specifically pinpoint the crimes that they are alerting others about. As Neighbourhood Watch is broken down into areas, listeners have access not only to general information but to specific information which is relevant to where they live or work.

In addition to posts per area, there are map views that show high-alert areas along with the latest alert in each of those areas. The Neighbourhood Watch component makes use of the latest Web 2.0 technology which allows the user to view different areas without reloading the entire page over and over again. This means that clicking on an area or category will dynamically update the page without the need to reload the entire site, saving users time and bandwidth.

“The beauty of the Neighbourhood Watch is that as it's totally user-driven, it allows our listeners to take control and interact with other users as and when they go onto the site. We are having awesome feedback from community organisations who hope to use the Neighbourhood Watch as a communication tool,” says Trish Taylor, CEO of East Coast Radio.

Newswatch editor Diane Macpherson says: "The Neighbourhood Watch is a sophisticated web-based tool which has been designed for us by our web developers in under a month. It represents one of the station's responses to help in the fight against crime."

“East Coast Radio values its standing in the community,” comments Taylor. “We have received numerous crime fighting suggestions from the public and are currently engaged with partners to create other workable solutions.”

Macpherson concludes, "We now need communities to use this tool to help keep them safe and sound and to proactively warn others about hotspots and the like. Information posted will be fed back on air, via Crimewatch with Seema Diahnan."

Crimewatch airs every Monday, Wednesday and Friday at 9.20am.

** Please note: The Crimewatch blog can be accessed via www.ecr.co.za. The Neighbourhood Watch aspect is on the top right hand side.