Columbia’s Neighborhood Watch is celebrating its 50th anniversary, but officials say the changing landscape of the city means the program needs changes, too. At a recent meeting, leaders discussed how to oversee Columbia’s rising number of rental properties in the city.
Downtown Columbia is home to three Universities, and increasingly plays home to a transient population of students. Even though downtown’s population density has increased in the last couple decades, Columbia Neighborhood Watch president Herb Watchinski says there are very few, if any, neighborhood watch groups in the downtown area.
“We have a very high percentage of rental property in Columbia, and therefore there's constant churning going on,” Watchinski said, “and so our job is to try to stay abreast of that and keep folks involved in the program throughout the city.”
According to data from bestneighborhood.org, more than two of every five people in Columbia rent their home or live in an apartment.
Columbia Neighborhood Watch leaders say they’re updating strategies to account for increased use of personal security cameras. According to data collected by safehome.org, 61% of US homeowners have security cameras on their property, which is a 19 percentage point increase from 2023. Columbia Police Department Sergeant and Columbia Neighborhood Watch police liaison Kyle Thornsberry says these cameras are beneficial for the police force.
“When it comes to personal safety and awareness, the cameras are great,” Thornsberry said, “obviously, we're not going to tell people that they have to have cameras or can’t have cameras. Public space, you know, that's their right.”
Privacy advocates worry about the proliferation of the technology as an intrusion. Thornsberry says, at least from a legal standpoint, the cameras are legal as long as they are recording public property.
