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In an effort to understand the attitudes, experiences and expectations citizens have of their police, the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police Department and UNC-Charlotte have worked together to generate data to assist the police in better responding to the public. At the request of Charlotte-Mecklenburg Chief of Police Dennis Nowicki, the Office of Justice Research, Department of Criminal Justice, University of North Carolina at Charlotte Professors Paul C. Friday, J. David Hirschel, and Richard C. Lumb conducted a survey of those served by the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police Department.
A telephone survey of a random sample of households was completed during April/May 1995. A total of 858 telephone interviews were completed giving a confidence limit of 95% with a margin of error of plus or minus 3 percent. Of the 858 interviews, 735 (85.7%) were City of Charlotte residents, 100 (11.7% County residents, and 22 (2.6%) from Mint Hill. The following analyses are based on the responses of Charlotte city residents only.
Neighborhood Ratings
Most people rated their neighborhoods as 'Good' or 'Excellent.' 84.0% rated their own neighborhoods as 'Good' (42.6%) or 'Excellent'(41.4%); only 2.9% rated their neighborhoods as 'Poor.' When specific problems were identified, few people felt that any problem was 'Major' and most felt that regardless of the problem specified it was not a problem in their own neighborhood. The crime of burglary was identified as a 'major' problem more than any other type of crime. However, it was a 'major' problem for only 4.9% and 'Somewhat' of a problem for 24.2% of city residents. 70.9% did not consider burglary a problem.
Overall, very few (7.6%) respondents indicated they were affected by illegal drug activity.
The public placed the highest priority on the apprehension of violent offenders - 94.1% rated this as a high priority. This was followed in rank order by the apprehension of drug offenders - 89.9% rated this as a high priority.
The third ranking priority was working with juveniles - rated high priority by 73.9% and as a medium priority by another 20.1%. Apprehension of property offenders ranked fourth (59.3% rated high), then Traffic (35.6% rated high), and finally the enforcement of housing regulations (20.5% rated this as high).
Charlotte citizens were nearly evenly split in their general feelings about the possibilities of being victimized. Of those who answered the question, "Do you personally fear being a victim of a crime?", 46.2% answered 'yes' and 53.8% said 'no.'
94.5% felt safe alone in their own neighborhoods during the day and 65.9% felt safe alone in their neighborhoods after dark. Citizens were most fearful in Uptown Charlotte at night where only 18.4% of the respondents indicated that they felt safe.
Women feared becoming a victim of crime more than men (52.5% vs. 35.1%) but there was no statistical significant difference in fear of victimization by race or age.
For Charlotte City residents (N=735) 19.7% reported being a victim of at least one crime in the last six months. Some were victims of more than one type of offense.
The single most common type of victimization was theft with 12.1% of the population reporting they had had something stolen from them during the last six months.
On the basis of the entire sample, (N=858) 81.1% ranked the overall performance of the Charlotte Mecklenburg Police Department as either 'Very Good' (34.1%) or 'Good' (47.0%). Only 1.1% responded that they felt the overall performance was 'Poor' or 'Very Poor' while 15% felt the overall performance was 'Average'; 2.7% expressed no opinion.Respondents were asked about their satisfaction with the police performance in dealing with three types of crime: violent, drugs and prostitution.
Overall, 87.0% of the public felt satisfied that the police were doing a good job of arresting violent offenders.
At least 80% of all racial groups feel the police do a good job arresting violent offenders. Whites are somewhat more likely than other racial groups to feel this way: 88.9% Whites, 86.7% Other racial groups, and 79.9% Black residents.
The proportion of those satisfied with drug law enforcement was about the same for each gender and all racial and age groups - around 60%.
Satisfaction with the level of enforcement of prostitution laws was higher for males (86.1%) than females (75.4%).
Consistently, all City residents supported strict enforcement of traffic laws (87.6%) while 59.2% believed traffic laws were adequately enforced in their neighborhoods.
The only significant demographic difference in support of strict traffic laws was by age. The 18-20 age group was the least likely to support strict enforcement while those over 60 were most likely to support strict enforcement.
Satisfaction with the level of patrol was significantly related to visibility. People who perceived the police to be highly visible, were more likely to be satisfied with the level of patrol. There was a 90% satisfaction rate among those who felt the police were highly visible as compared with a 55% satisfaction rate among those who believed the police were not highly visible.
The survey question that was asked was: "If you have had contact with the police, have they generally been courteous?". Those who reported specific contact - such as reporting a crime or asking for information - were compared with those who did not report a specific contact within the last six months.
94.6% of those reporting specific contact with the police reported them to be courteous while only 69.3% of those with 'generalized' contact considered the police to be courteous.
Those who considered the police to be courteous also evaluated overall police performance more highly than those who believed the police were not courteous.
There were no differences in the perception of courtesy by gender, race, or age.
Those most satisfied with the police response were those whose contact involved a traffic accident (87.1%) noise (86.7%) or seeking advice (86.7%). The lowest level of satisfaction occured when reporting a crime - 71.7% were satisfied.
A majority (67.1%) of the respondents were aware that the police were attempting to place emphasis on neighborhoods and an even higher percentage (82.7%) felt that the police understood their neighborhoods and the problems that existed.
Almost half (46.4%) said that they themselves or someone they had observed had been helped by the police on a matter other than responding to crime.
Only 20% believed the police had personally gotten to know them and their neighbors; 16.5% responded that they knew a neighborhood officer by name.
Less than ten percent of City residents had attended a community crime prevention program sponsored by the police.
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