The Escambia County Sheriff’s Office is hosting the second annual “Bridging the Gap” crime prevention summit this week in Pensacola.
Sgt. Delarian Wiggins with the ECSO organized the summit in 2014 and holds the same role for this summit, which features crime prevention experts, community leaders, and policy makers seeking ways to reduce crime.
“We can’t do it alone,” said Wiggins at last year’s summit. “A lot of people want to depend on law enforcement. We can get out and do the job, but actually if we have the eyes and ears in the community to relay information back to us, it helps us to solve some of the unsolved homicides as well as some of the break-ins that are going on in the community.”
A number of local officials greeted the crowd with their opening remarks. State Attorney Bill Eddins talked about some of the positive changes : beginning with an 11% decline in crime in the first half of 2014 compared to the same period last year, according to figures from the ECSO.
“Why? We don’t know for sure,” Eddins said. “However, we know that under the Sheriff’s reign, the neighborhood watch groups have skyrocketed: from 13 to 127 in the past five years. And we hope that conferences such as this will cause it to continue to do so.”
Escambia School Superintendent Malcolm Thomas told the audience that changes will not come overnight, nor will they come in giant leaps and bounds. Rather he said, it’s the little things that need to add up.
Escambia County Sheriff David Morgan told the crowd last August that while growing up during the height of the Cold War, he never feared a nuclear attack. But today, he fears losing the country from within.
“There’s a corollary here, ladies and gentlemen, with our community,” Morgan said. “If you’re not standing up in your community with your pastors and with law enforcement, and setting a standard in your community of what is acceptable and unacceptable, we’re being destroyed from within. You know, the evil one’s greatest tool is divisiveness; I don’t have to be in your face, I just have to sow a seed of doubt.”
Looking ahead to this week’s conference, to be held in the evening to encourage more participation, guest speakers will include Sheriff Morgan, Dr. Willie Kimmons of the group Save Children, Save Schools, new Pensacola Police Chief David Alexander, and Major Craig McQueen of the Miami Police Department.
The 2015 edition of “Bridge the Gap” kicks off Monday evening at the Brownsville Community Center on West DeSoto Street, and continues on Tuesday and Wednesday evenings. All sessions begin at six o’clock.
