Public Safety

"eWatch" System Keeps Public Informed

By Alison St John / Reporter

Published November 13, 2009 at 11:08 AM PST

This story was published more than 15 years ago.

San Diego County residents who want more information about crime in their neighborhood can soon register with a new service that updates them as crimes happen.

Related Document

SANDAG Executive Committee Agenda for Nov. 13: Regional eWatch Phase I Demonstration (PDF)

The sheriff’s department will expand the service called “eWatch." It is funded by a $75,000 grant from Homeland Security, with the goal of getting the public more aware of neighborhood crime.

With the grant, the sheriff's department, partnered with the Automated Regional Justice Information System, will be able to expand the city of San Diego's current "eWatch" subscription service to the entire county.

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Pam Scanlon, head of ARJIS, said, “It’s very easy to use, you can just put in a cross street, an intersection, or an address, you pick your radius of how far you want your search to be, select your crime types and off you go.”

Scanlon said subscribers get an e-mail when a crime is committed in their area, and a link to a public crime map on the Web that has more information.

She says the next step is to make the service interactive, so the public can report suspicious activity.

Public Safety

Alison St John

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Alison St John currently serves as a general assignment reporter and occasionally co-hosts KPBS Midday Edition. She fell in love with KPBS Radio when she arrived in San Diego in 1985 and first heard NPR. She has been a voice on KPBS Radio since 1989, and has served as a news reporter for radio, TV and the web, as well as anchoring, hosting, producing and editing. Alison has reported on stories about North County and was based in the KPBS' North County Bureau. Alison covered the metro beat during the critical period of the San Diego City pension crisis, and the education beat while Alan Bersin was the controversial Superintendent of San Diego City School District. She covered health when the industry was converting to managed care and told welfare reform stories in the late 1990s when Clinton was “ending welfare as we know it.” She has covered land use issues extensively, looking at the challenges of meeting a growing population while preserving community character, and developing a better transportation system to meet environmental concerns. She has done many stories on the military in San Diego, and the series she edited on the challenges veterans face returning from active duty to civilian life won “Best of Show” from the San Diego Society of Professional Journalists. She occasionally hosts the KPBS Roundtable and KPBS Midday Edition. Alison has won awards from the San Diego Press Club, the Society of Professional Journalists, the Associated Press TV and Radio Association, and the California Golden Mike Awards. Alison was born in Tanzania, brought up in Scotland, and earned her degree in psychology and sociology from Durham University in England. Her postgraduate diploma is in student counseling. She worked in England, Nigeria, Switzerland, Belgium, India, and Japan before moving to the United States in 1981. She now lives in Oceanside and enjoys how her community is growing and changing.