By Ivan Pereira
A member of NYPD’s top brass and a southeast Queens resident paid a visit to the community last week to encourage youth to get discipline in their lives and avoid falling into the cracks that could lead to crime.
Chief Philip Banks, head of the Police Department’s community affairs unit, gave a presentation to Community Board 12 during its monthly meeting last week about some of the programs the department offers for teens that will keep them off the street. He also provided some tips to parents on how to keep their children safe in the age of social networking.
Banks, the father of two sons, a 22-year-old and a 13-year-old, said the NYPD’s annual summer camp is successful, but the number of campers is not as high as he would like it to be.
“I’d love to go to the commissioner and tell him we have 20,000 [applicants]. We need more funding for this,” he said.
The camp is held in places all over the city, including York College, and provides the kids and teens with drills, exercise regimens and field trips. Banks said the camp participants enjoy the strict schedule, which can help them develop as adults.
“The kids are asking for discipline,” he said.
The chief said parents should be more careful about their children’s activities and must be tech savvy. Banks said locking kids in their room and curfews have no effectiveness anymore because of social networking web sites.
Although they may remain in the house, the children could be chatting with dangerous people, especially gangs, which Banks said are taking to Facebook and MySpace to recruit members.
School safety officers have also been taking measures to improve their relations with students, the chief said. The officers conduct sit-downs with students, who provide candid feedback about the police in the hallways, according to Banks.
“We’re getting good results because they tell us what we are doing wrong and we go out and fix that,” he said.
Reach reporter Ivan Pereira by e-mail at ipereira@cnglocal.com or by phone at 718-260-4546.
