Our police department has a flyer that lists things to prevent car break ins at home and in shopping center's. I got a pdf copy of it and posted it on every apt door and put it on Facebook. With Christmas around the corner it is a good reminder. Once I posted it on all the doors and someone yelled at me because their car got broken into, I went down the list, did you leave anything in your vehicle in plain sight? Almost always the answer was yes. I would then ask them if they needed another police dept flyer about car break in prevention. Silence... I also asked if they made a police report and to share the case #. Many do not want to call the police they want to blame you. Put the ball back in their basketball court.

Build a relationship with your local PD. Take them pizzas or cookies or something and make them your new friend! Ask them to please roll through the community at different hours of the day. Staggered hours and a regular presence will help. Maybe even get together with other managers at your comps for a safety meeting.

Lease to local law enforcement and give a discount..make it a requirement that they drive their patrol vehicles home. It really is a deterrent...and a win win for everybody.

We recently had this happen. Cameras will not help, they literally looked at ours and gave us the bird. All the cameras show is “yep, criminals are busting windows out” but even as high quality as our cameras are, you can’t see through face masks and hoodies.

Your police should be out looking. Guarantee it is not just your community.

We had this issue at a site any years ago. Our courtesy officer /police officer had sticky notes he placed on cars that said something like "I see items in your car I would steal if I was a theif. From the local PD" something like that, I guess they use them periodically around town. I dont know if it helped but hopefully people took the hint and didnt leave items lay out I their cars. Typically car thieves look in cars and break in when doors are unlocked or items are visible... or so they said