Recent Community Safety Meeting Hosted By Mike Bonin

Did you miss the March 24th community meeting regarding safety in Westchester and the Playas? The meeting opened with a very personal story told by our City Councilman Mike Bonin about his own encounter with a home intruder.

With approximately 400 people in attendance, the vast majority came from Westchester, specifically West of Sepulveda. We take our safety and security very seriously here. Much credit for that goes to Kentwood resident & Neighborhood Council President Cyndi Hench, hailed by Mike Bonin at the meeting as LA’s “Queen of Neighborhood Watch” (see approximately at the 8-1/2 minute mark). A big shout out also goes to the work being done by our homeowners’ association, Kentwood Home Guardians.

I attended the meeting and was super-impressed with how all the law enforcement agencies in our community (LAPD, LAX, LAUSD and others) work together and how responsive they are to community calls and concerns. Especially interesting is the work LAPD is doing with Predictive Policing.

Extra interesting to this social media geek is the discussion around the 13 minute mark about the role social media is playing in public safety. The topic comes up again around 25 minutes when LAPD reports that crime isn’t up in our community. It’s our ability to discuss and share about crime with social media that’s up.

Meet our local law enforcement contacts around the 30 minute mark.

Below is a video of the meeting. Don’t let the two hour time length deter you. The meeting lasted about an hour. The remainder of the video is questions from the community.