Background and methodology
The Virginia Highland Security Patrol (or FBAC which stands
for Fight Back Against Crime) is a security patrol program that is staffed by
off-duty Atlanta police, supported through voluntary contributions from
residents and businesses, and administered by neighborhood volunteers. In
February 2015 a survey was conducted to assist the volunteers to improve
service and increase membership. The current survey is being conducted to
assess the impact of changes made to the program in the past six months.
The survey was conducted online between August 12, 2015 and August
26, 2015. It was promoted via postings on FBAC’s Facebook Page, Nextdoor, and the
VHList neighborhood bulletin board on Yahoo.
According to Nextdoor, there are now 6,059 households in
Virginia-Highland. This is up slightly from our earlier survey which indicated 5,964
households. Nextdoor identifies 2071 households with at least one for a total
of 2,991 members, 1,814 subscribe to the VHList, and 232 people have liked the
FBAC Facebook page. However, there is overlap between these channels, so a
definitive understanding of how many Virginia Highland Residents were exposed
to the survey is not possible.
The survey was developed by Kay Stephenson with input from
Nancy Safay, and John Wolfinger (FBAC volunteers), and from Sgt. Clark who
manages the officers who work for the patrol. Because this was a follow-up
survey, the questions focused in three areas: awareness of FBAC, membership in
FBAC, and likelihood that the respondent would recommend FBAC to another
resident. In addition, respondents were provided with the opportunity to share
any other information with the team via write-in.
Respondents
A total of fifty-eight people responded to the survey. This
is substantially lower than the 172 respondents to the initial survey conducted
in February, but a lower response rate is expected on a follow-up.
Note that this survey is not a scientific sampling and the
response rate (estimated to be less than 10% of all Virginia Highland
residents) is insufficient to predict responses for the neighborhood at large.
Rather it offers a quick view of what members and non-members are thinking.
Typically such a survey attracts more responses from strong supporters and
strong detractors than folks in the middle.
Questions and Responses
Question 1 – Are you familiar with FBAC (Fight Back Against Crime) the
Virginia Highland Security Patrol?
All but one of our
fifty-eight respondents was familiar with FBAC prior to this survey.
Are you a member of FBAC?
In the initial survey respondents were evenly split between
members and non-members. In this follow-up, we found that members responded
about 2:1 as compared to non-members. Again, this is not surprising as members
are more likely to support FBAC and be willing to invest time in a survey.
How likely are you to recommend FBAC (Fight Back Against Crime) the
Virginia Highland Security Patrol to another resident?
None of our
respondents skipped this question and the findings were generally positive. As
in the previous survey, respondents were asked to indicate the likelihood of
recommendation on a scale of zero to ten, with zero being not at all likely and
ten being extremely likely.
The results show that 84% of members were somewhat likely,
likely or extremely likely to recommend the program. Perhaps more
interestingly, 30% of non-members fell into the same categories.
A more contemporary way of looking at satisfaction with a
product or service is to look at the Net Promotor Score (NPS). In this
methodology, those who replied in the range of zero to six are considered
detractors. Those responding in the range of seven to eight are considered
passive, and those responding in the range of 9-10 are termed promoters. Obviously
with a program such as ours, we need as many of our members as possible to be
actively promoting FBAC.
In our survey 34% of respondents were detractors and 55%
were promoters which yields a NPS of 21. For reference our NPS was only 15 on
the initial survey, so this reflects a positive improvement. The change appears
to come from neutrals that have been converted to promoters, hopefully
reflecting our better communication and education efforts.
Is there anything else you would like to share with the FBAC volunteers? If
you would like a response, please include your email address.
With this survey we did not ask for specific reasons that
respondents were or were not members, we simply provided the opportunity to
share any additional information that they thought would be helpful. Here are
the comments. I have organized the comments into three categories – negative,
positive, and questions & suggestions.
Negative
The two concerns continue to be price and visibility of
patrol cars and officers. Keep in mind that this survey was completed before we
discussed asking officers to make a more visible presence in the commercial
nodes on Friday and Saturday evenings.
·
I am not inclined to sign up for FBAC because I
have only seen an FBAC patrol car once or twice in the past several
months. My next door neighbor is a
member and I have never seen anyone patrol or drive by his house.
·
My perception continues to be that the patrol
rarely covers my area (Orme Circle /Monroe). I have never seen a patrol
vehicle. Perhaps it is late at night but nevertheless I have lived in the home
6 years and have never noticed a patrol. When I lived in Midtown I would see
the MPSA truck multiple times each week.
·
I still think that the pricing for condominium
and apartment complexes is ridiculous. I
live in a condo and pay for a single condo membership, because there is no way
of convincing my other 15 neighbors that FBAC membership is a reasonable value
to our building for the expense. I am
seriously doubtful that any of the condo communities with more than 10 units in
the neighborhood are members of FBAC.
This opinion is based on the fact that when I drive through the
neighborhood, I do not see a single a single street where 10 houses in a row
are FBAC members. If 10 single family
homes all in a row cannot all agree that supporting FBAC is worthwhile, why can
FBAC expect 10 condo owners all in the same building to participate? This however, is the unreasonable expectation
which the current FBAC pricing structure imposes when it states that "The
entire complex must join for these rates to apply." I think that if FBAC
implemented a more reasonable pricing structures for apartment and
condominiums, it is likely that many more of these residential communities
would participate than currently do.
·
I am a recent member, but let my membership
lapse because we never see a patrol on our street (Orme Circle) despite the
fact that quite a few residents belong.
A visible presence in the neighborhood is important to us.
·
I'd like to see the FBAC vehicles look more like
security patrol cars, with even more prominent signage, as a visual deterrent
and signal to criminals that they should go to a different neighborhood and not
ours. Similar to what Morningside has: the vehicles look like a security patrol
car, not like a car with an Avon magnetic sign on the side of the car.
·
I don't see any sign of the officers
patrolling. While stealth is great for
capturing bad guys. A show of force is a
better deterrent, and Advertising for the group. Maybe just that I know longer
walk at night.
·
Very expensive compared to adjacent
neighborhoods
Positive
The most often mentioned benefit continues to be vacation
home checks.
·
Appreciate very much the vacation checks.
·
I didn't know a thing about FBAC, but I'm glad
to know it exists. Crime in the area seems to be at an all-time high.
·
I appreciate the informative newsletters.
·
We plan on becoming a member, just haven't
gotten round to it.
·
Glad to know they are out in our
neighborhood. Thanks!!
·
I think the FBAC public relations campaign is
working well, I do know more about FBAC now.
Our household has still not joined, mainly for financial reasons. $300 a year is probably a good investment but
that on top of $8000 in taxes is just hard to bite right now. That said, FBAC is
still on our list for consideration.
·
I appreciate this service. Have used it a number of times when out of
town.
·
Thank you for all your time and commitment to
our neighborhood.
·
FBAC looked after our home while on vacation. We
had to cut the vacation short and in the confusion to get home we didn't
contact FBAC. An officer saw the lights on and investigated. We were
embarrassed but grateful for the attention and service. Thanks so much - we
will definitely recommend FBAC and we will continue to pay for and use the
service.
·
Good program!
Questions
& Suggestions
These comments will be addressed in the cover message when
the report is distributed.
·
Is it an idea to develop a referral program?
Where any neighbor that brings on a new member gets X number of months free
membership? Any program like this suffers from the "free rider"
challenge....
·
It looks like the biggest problem in our
community is car break-ins. From the
emails, these are rarely observed and rarely is anyone caught, so they
continue. How about a new program to
stop these incidents? One way to do
this, is with a bait car in one of the high incident areas, with a laptop bag
on the seat, and an officer nearby. I
would be happy to help support financially a project that gets real results on
the car break-ins, and I'm sure others would too if we could show results.
· What do you recommend that we can do as
residents politically or otherwise to deter or prevent violent crimes in the
neighborhood? The recent armed robberies
and carjacking are disturbing.