Escambia County Sheriff Chip Simmons hopes to duplicate Operation Brownsville in other neighborhoods in the county. Over the next 60 days, his agency will work with the Pensacola Police Department, the county, city and area nonprofits to increase public safety, services and outreach in the Brownsville community, stretching from E Street to Kirk Street with Jackson and Avery streets serving as the southern and northern borders.
How will the sheriff measure success?
“First of all, it’s easier for law enforcement to measure success, but I think success is two related things,” Sheriff Simmons answered. “If we do extra patrols in Brownsville, less crime would be committed. But we also will be able to document warrant services, traffic stops, arrests and the cost of service. It’s also going to be what we can show that we have done in partnership with the Pensacola Police Department.”
The second measure is community impact. “It’s the involvement with our community partners and seeing what that looks like. Ultimately, there will be an evaluation–Is it worth it? Is this good? Is that good? Do we take some stuff out? Do we add some stuff to it?”
The sheriff added, “I would say that this is very much a pilot program. We will see if we can do it again in other areas.”
The operation area was chosen because it has nearly equal coverage from ECSO and PPD. “We wanted to use a boundary that incorporated the city and county,” said Simmons. “I can’t say that I looked at it and said, ‘Oh, this is a high crime area right here.’ There’re some things that we wanted to address in the Brownsville community, but a lot of what’s happening in Brownsville is happening in other communities as well.”
He continued, “If this works in Brownsville, the thought is that it’ll work in other neighborhoods.”
If other nonprofits would like to get involved in Operation Brownsville, Sheriff Simmons recommended they email Neighborhood Specialist Ronnie Rivera – rdrivera@escambia.com. He will add their programs to the calendar on the ECSO website.
One thing you will not find on the calendar is law enforcement operations. The sheriff said, “We have had a couple conversations with the Pensacola Police Department, and we are working on our operations that we’re not putting on the calendar because we don’t want to let them know exactly where we’re going to be at any given moment.”
The law enforcement statistics will be posted later.