By Nathan Duke
Staff Writer

The Goffstown Police Department has gotten passing marks from residents, according to an college survey.

The department, in coordination with Saint Anselm College Sociology Chairman Dr. Michael Dupre and about 25 of his students, conducted the survey to see if Goffstown residents are satisfied with department operations.

Senior Krista Byam acted as student coordinator on the project, during which 25 volunteers placed calls to Goffstown residents chosen at random from the phone book and asked them questions about local crimes, police performance and functions they would like to see the police perform.

The department has been surveying residents almost every year for the past 18 years. The project originally began when former Chief Steve Monier formed a partnership with Dupre.

Police Chief Michael French said he intends to conduct the survey annually.

He said he was pleased to find most residents polled approved of the department's current operations.

"It's good to reach out to the citizens of Goffstown that we serve and ask their opinion about how we are doing," he said. "We take the results of the survey very seriously. We will continue to study (the results) and, if possible, make adjustments to address residents' concerns." He said the survey is a good forum for citizen's concerns, as well as a potential tool for fighting crime.

"It encourages people to be our eyes and ears in the community," he said. "Nobody knows a community like the people in it."

The overall report was pretty close to expectation in most areas, said French.

He said 89 percent of those polled rated the overall performance of the department as "good" or "excellent."

Most residents said they would like for police to keep operations the same as they are now in most areas, which included preventative patrols in residential and business areas, drug enforcement, crime prevention and community relations programs, checking homes for residents on vacation, traffic enforcement, drunk driving enforcement and stopping suspicious persons.

French said traffic enforcement was one of the highest areas of concern, as he expected. However, he said concerns about drugs and alcohol were higher than he expected. Theft and burglary were also highly ranked.

In terms of police performance, most residents said the town's 29 sworn officers have a good attitude toward citizens and are competent in their duties. French said he was pleased to see most people feel safe where they live.

"It was encouraging that roughly 91 percent of the people surveyed consider their neighborhood or community at large to be safe," he said.

To be a valid survey, the student pollsters were required to interview 300 of the town's estimated 17,900 residents anonymously over the phone.

Byam acted as student coordinator on the project and based her senior thesis on the survey's findings. She enlisted 25 student volunteers to place calls from the police station from 6 to 9 p.m. for about two weeks in late March and early April.

The students were given a list of questions from the department to ask residents, but also came up with their own questions to add to the survey. Dupre said the survey was a great learning experience for his students.

"This is a hands-on experience," he said. "When (the students) did this, they were directing an actual community survey as if they were hired (by an organization) to do an actual poll. It was a win-win situation for both the police and the students."

French said the department will continue to review the surveys to determine whether any changes in operations are required. He said the surveys were just released to the selectmen last month and that the department has not had a major staff meeting since the survey was finished.

In the meantime, he said he was hesitant to publish any immediate changes the department will be making, if any. "The bad guys read the papers too," he said.