MEXICO — The number of crimes in town dropped during 2017, according to Police Chief Roy Hodsdon.

That’s good news following the Maine Department of Public Safety’s uniform crime report released last October for 2016. It concluded Mexico’s crime rate was 50 percent higher than any other municipality in the state, based on its population.

Hodsdon said theft calls in 2017 dropped by five from the previous year, to 157. They dropped considerably from 2015, which had 189. Burglary calls dropped from 50 to 29, drug offenses from 142 to 113, and simple assaults from 123 to 112.

The total number of offenses went down from 3,576 in 2016 to 3,462.

Hodsdon attributes the lower number, in part, to the severe weather in December. Calls that month were about 100 fewer than 2016.

At least a third of the larcenies in 2016 were shoplifters at Walmart, the chief said.

Hodsdon said Rumford and Mexico’s most problematic areas border the Androscoggin River and people often go back and forth between the towns.

“It’s all scrunched together” and is responsible for many of the car burglaries and domestic violence that pushes up the crime rate in both towns, he said.

Hodsdon said drugs are the precursor to many of the crime calls because they also lead to domestic issues, child abuse, aggravated assaults, assaults, thefts and burglaries.

“When we do those area drug raids, you notice afterward that you start taking out the source for drugs for a little bit in the area, and then you start noticing your assaults go up, your domestics go up because they don’t have their drug fix,” he said. “They start drinking more and trying to counter whatever they were taking because they don’t have it, because we’ve closed that circuit they were getting them from for a time.”

Across Maine, five municipalities posted crime rates above 40 percent: Augusta at 41.37; Waterville at 43.13; Rumford at 43.39; Bangor at 43.89; and Mexico at 68.34.

Mexico was coined the crime capital of Maine following the state report, which Hodsdon disputed.

“I know they take our size and our crimes, then use it as a percentage based; the town of Mexico is a very safe community,” he said.

Hodsdon said the larger cities have the murders, the armed robberies, gross sexual assaults. “They have larger numbers, but because there population is so much larger than ours, it makes our town with our per capita stand out.”

“It’s not fair to single us out as the crime capital of Maine,” he said.

Town Manager Jack Gaudet noted shortly after those statewide stats were released that he fielded a call from someone who reconsidered a move to Mexico after seeing those stats.

“I think any individual business or corporation that wants to come here needs to realize that these are just a small amount of complaints for a town of our size,” Hodsdon said. “Yes, it’s a lot for us to handle because we’re a five-person police department. However, we’re not coming in and finding burglaries and thefts every day we’re working.”

He said his department has taken steps to make the community safer.

Hodsdon said the Neighborhood Watch Program is in its third year. The volunteers are spread out throughout the town, as are the Neighborhood Watch signs.

They generally meet at the police department at 5:30 p.m. on the second Tuesday of the month. The public is invited to attend.

“I think that’s played a huge role in our crime declining,” he said.

Police have a Facebook page, which includes letting people know the conditions of the local streets during the winter. Hodsdon noted he uses Facebook to focus “only on positive things happening in our community.”

They also have a confidential tip line (364-5686) and a Senior Watch Program.

“Being visible, having our Neighborhood Watch Program and having our citizens and business people call us with what they’re seeing has been really huge for us,” he said.

“People who want to come here need to look at it at face value,” he said. Don’t take those (state) numbers and let them scare you. I still feel safe, every day, coming to work. I think it’s a good place to live and work.”

bfarrin@sunmediagroup.net

Mexico Police Chief Roy Hodsdon works in his office. (Bruce Farrin/Rumford Falls Times)

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