Business owners should do more to prevent burglaries, but residents generally are doing pretty well, according to the city police department's 1995 report.
Bountiful business burglaries increased from 37 in 1994 to 45 the next year, while residential burglaries decreased from 133 to 122.Chief Paul Rapp attributed the burglary increase to a lack of alarm systems installed in businesses. Many new homes, on the other hand, have such systems.
"The homes in Bountiful have a pretty high rate of alarms," Rapp said. "For so long Bountiful has been an open community where we didn't worry so much about locking our doors," but residents have responded to an increase in crime from the innocent days of yore.
Arrests of both adults and juveniles have increased markedly in the last four years - a 30 percent jump, culminating in 2,113 arrests last year. Rapp said most of the additional arrests are occurring in three areas: gang graffiti, general alcohol offenses (not DUIs) and drugs.
An arrest is manpower-intensive, requiring a lot of time for officers who could be out on the street policing. The large increase in arrests shows Bountiful police have become more efficient, Rapp said.
Bountiful doesn't have a lot of indigenous gang activity, but Councilwoman Barbara Holt said many Salt Lake gangs come to Bountiful to finance their activity through burglaries and other crimes. Rapp agreed.
"They come here where the police don't know their cars, where they're not familiar with them," he said.
In the past, Bountiful police conducted roadblocks where they checked cars for drugs and the like, but no longer. Courts have severely restricted how such checks can be done.
"It's so loaded with problems and details it's not worth it," said City Attorney Russell Mahan.
That's a disappointment to Councilman Harold Shafter, who said he favors coming down hard on criminals and laments court-imposed enforcement restrictions.
Even given the advantages of coming into Bountiful, Rapp said bad guys in Salt Lake also realize the disadvantages. That slows the northward flow somewhat.
"The drug conviction rate and sexual offender conviction rate in Davis County is relatively high," he said. "That information does get out among the criminal element."
Property crimes in Bountiful such as vandalism and theft were up slightly, from 1,071 to 1,157, but that figure may be misleading. The increase is likely due to the new resource police officers in Viewmont and Bountiful high schools, resulting in more crimes reported there, Rapp said. Previously, petty crimes were often handled within the schools and not reported to police.
Most officials agree that the resource officers' presence has actually caused a decrease in criminal activity at the high schools.