Fayette County’s new sheriff, Wayne Hannah, wants more help from the public to combat crime.

Hannah is encouraging residents and business owners to report any suspicious activity immediately.

In doing so deputies can respond and if the situation is harmless, no one is hurt by having it checked out, Hannah said. But if it is a crime deputies have the chance to take action, he added.

“If you see things, please call us. We can’t stress that enough,” Hannah said. “So many times we go out and work a crime scene and find out that someone in the neighborhood or business area saw something, thought it looked out of the ordinary but didn’t think enough about it to call. And if its legitimate that’s fine, we don’t mind, that’s what we’re there for.”

Hannah said that residents are best-equipped to detect suspicious vehicles or suspicious persons in their area ... as opposed to a deputy on patrol who doesn’t know the neighborhood as well.

“If we get there and check it out and it is a plumber working, that’s fine,” Hannah said. “If it’s a burglar hauling off the house, we catch them.”

Hannah is also going to depend on the public for accountability purposes. He cited a recent anonymous complaint published in this paper last week about a sheriff’s deputy who left his patrol car running while getting a haircut. The complaint did not say if the officer was on duty or not.

But each car has a three-digit number on it in case there are issues with that vehicle so the public can report them to the sheriff’s office.

“Let me know that car number and I’ll see what was going on there,” Hannah said. “If its legitimate I’ll let you know. If it’s not we can deal with it.”

Hannah noted that the department’s K-9 cars must be left running to keep the temperature down for the health of the dogs, but he also noted those cars are well-marked.

To help reduce crime, Hannah wants to dramatically increase participation in the department’s neighborhood watch program. He cited recent remarks from Forsyth County Sheriff Ted Paxton on how neighborhood watch programs have drastically reduced property crime rates there.

Forsyth had 26 neighborhood watches in 2005 and increased it to more than 200 today, Hannah said.

“Their property crime rate dropped dramatically,” Hannah said. “And he attributes it to the fact they were doing the neighborhood watch program in residential areas.”

Hannah hopes to get more people involved in the program, which encourages the reporting of any strange vehicles or other odd sights so they can be quickly investigated by deputies.

In addition to targeting homeowners associations for the neighborhood watch program, the sheriff’s office will also reach out to senior citizens, perhaps offering special programs at the county’s senior citizen center, Hannah said. That will allow them to be made aware of crimes that target them, such as telephone scams.

The sheriff’s office will also be focusing on crime deterrence through a new program designed to evaluate businesses and how they can take steps to reduce the possibility of a crime occurring, Hannah said. For example, a convenience store may want to rearrange its shelving so the attendant can see all the way down each aisle for safety concerns, Hannah said.

Another example is of businesses that have small automated teller machines, which have been targeted in the past in metro Atlanta for smash and grab burglaries. Hannah said that concrete posts could be installed in front of the business to prevent vehicles from being backed through the storefront to gain access to the ATM.

“There’s a whole host of crime-deterrent tactics that can be used,” Hannah said.

Another issue businesses can address is in security systems. Some have a motion detector light that blinks whenever it senses movement, and criminals have been known to use those during a store’s open hours to determine paths they can take in the store so they can go undetected by the motion sensor when the store is closed, Hannah said.

In the future Hannah wants to have a computerized system that would send out emails to areas notifying people of particular crimes that have been committed in their vicinity.

“It could be we’ve had several vehicles stolen from this area, or several vehicle break-ins,” Hannah said.

That information could be shared with contacts at homeowners associations and the like to help spread the word, Hannah said.

Hannah is hoping to soon expand the aviation unit’s operating hours in the future. The Hawk 1 helicopter requires a pilot and an observer who can operate the technical equipment on board including a night vision camera, mapping system and light.

“We’re kind of limited on the use of that helicopter right now because we just need some more people,” Hannah said.

Hannah also is looking forward to bringing on board two new dogs that will handle both narcotics and tracking operations.

Hannah said he’ll be more involved in the budgeting process, including the presentations to the county commission. Although he plans to present one combined budget for the entire department to the commissioner, he anticipates keeping each division’s budget split up so the division directors will be responsible for overseeing their budget.

Hannah swore in all the new sheriff’s employees and gave them a ceremonial “challenge coin” on which they are exhorted to “Travel the path of integrity without looking back for there is never a wrong time to do the right thing.”

Hannah said he expects his employees to not lie, steal or violate their oath of office. He also expects fairness and professional conduct.

Hannah reminded his charges that they must be aware of their conduct both when in uniform and on duty ... and when not in uniform and off-duty, as the public will be aware of their position regardless.

“They are watching how you drive,” Hannah said. “If you didn’t make a complete stop and if you went through that light and it was questionable whether you could’ve stopped if it was red or not, people are watching.”

Hannah said one of his goals for sheriff’s employees is to create an atmosphere where the sheriff’s office can get back to the family-type air it used to have before it grew so large.

Hannah said he remembered how the radio room where he began with the department used to be a central gathering point for sheriff’s officials. But as the department grew in both manpower and physical size, including the new jail being in a separate building, things changed.

“We’re not that little close-knit family anymore but I think we can be a big family and still be kind of close-knit,” Hannah said.