During last night’s National Night Out, we had the opportunity to shadow Antioch Police Chief Allan Cantando and Mayor Wade Harper as they made their way to a few of the 31 total locations.
The National Night Out Program is a community-police-awareness-raising event held on the first Tuesday of August where community block parties/neighborhood watches get together and “hang out” with one another to meet neighbors and talk about local police issues.
During our time with the Chief and Mayor, they met several residents who were concerned about the crime and expressed their urgency at a solution be provided.
Folks expressed their concerns about shootings, speeding, burglary, speed bump suggestions and crime tips.
“We need to get back to where we were with our staffing five years ago and be more proactive department instead of a reactive department. They level of frustration you feel with police staffing, I feel it to. I live in this community with my wife and three-year-old son. I want everything that all of you want because I live here to and vested just like you are,” said Chief Cantando. “We want to get back to a proactive way of life to make the city better than it is today.”
Mayor Harper spoke at multiple events thanking folks for their support of the community and participating in the event. We talked up Antioch and the positives going on.
“For everyone negative thing someone says about our city, I have 20 positives,” said Harper. “Antioch is a great city and if we support our police department, we can continue to reduce crime and make our town safer.”
Here are some pictures of last night’s event. We attended three events with the chief and the mayor, they attended a total of 6 events of the city’s 31-locaitons. Brentwood, Oakley and Pittsburg also had events last night.
1 comment
Thanks for the pictures. This is a wonderful yearly event usually well attended by the Neighborhood Watch groups.
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