Site Crime History

Anecdotes vs. Facts

Many police departments these days have maps of crimes in your area on the internet. Look into these for 1/4 to 3 miles around your site; depending on urban, suburban or "isolated" location(s). Get stories from other guard's Site Incident Reports. Some police departments have printouts of crimes issued each month. Some have "Police-Business Crime Prevention Coalition" meetings monthly or quarterly. Look into it!

At every site I've worked, while speaking to employees, some will say "This is a high crime area". When questioned further, they mention thefts, vandalism, trespassers and fires. It will sound like these happen every week!

People are people. They conflate and compress time based on "interesting" occurences. Therefore the "high crime" area, really has not had a trespasser in 6 months (and that was a homeless guy pushing a shopping cart at 1 MPH), a fire in 2 years, a theft in 3 months (her lunch was taken from company frig!) and that rape happened 6 years ago--3 blocks away. But they are wary if not actually scared!
Humans are very poor judges of risk. However do not minimize these concerns!

One must take these concerns seriously...thats why you are there after all! It is why you get paid! GTM!

With factual information  from the police and Site Incident Reports (and a formal security risk assessment including the full spectrum of threats and vulnerabilities) one can start to realistically judge risk and vulnerabilities and establish effective crime-threat prevention and response programs. (if you are permitted to do anything and can sell the ideas, TANSTAAFL-nothing is free),

From anecdotes one can see what the employees and site management fear and ensure addressing these fears become part of your daily visible 'delivery of services'. 
[Security Theater is part of our job....but it should not be the whole job.]