Baltimore is a small town, and nothing reminds you of that more than a community meeting, where neighborhood business is aired. Talking about crime here doesn't mean reciting stats. It means complaining about the suspected drug house next door. "Troubled teens" are given names that are shouted out to police in the room.

Starting this crime blog, I thought it would be good to attend as many of these meetings as possible. Statistics show crime is down, and attendees at last night's Southern District Police and Community Relations Council applauded the numbers as Deputy Major Charles Carter read them out. Shootings down 28 percent. Assaults down 11 percent. Car thefts down 50 percent.

But the more than 50 people who packed the station's roll call room remained frustrated.

"The thugs. The hoodlums. The drug dealers. The prostitutes. I can feel safer going downtown in the middle of the night than in my own neighborhood," said Ken Ayers of Brooklyn. "You have to worry about getting shot from a drug deal gone bad or having your wife hit on by one of the Johns."

A group singled out a house on Pontiac Street, complaining that the teen who lives there sells drugs on the sidewalk and intimidates people who step outside their rowhouses. "It's bleeding the neighborhood," said resident Pat Wills.

Carter stood at the podium as a TV screen behind him flashed images of "The Top 10 persons of interest in Brooklyn/Curtis Bay" and jotted down notes. He promised to send a squad car to Fairhaven Avenue where people told him drivers run a stop sign. And he said detectives would check on construction trailers at an elementary school taken over by prostitutes.

"If you don't see things improve, please call and let me know and I'll get on the case," Carter said.

Prostitution was the hot topic. Several community leaders talked about some new initiatives, which I'll write about later. This is just the start of blogging about crime all over the city. Please let me know about your problems, your community meetings and your crime walks, and I'll try to come to and write about as many as I can.

The Southern District meeting wasn't all doom and gloom. Linda M. Schwartz, the branch manager of the Brooklyn branch of the Enoch Pratt Free Library, honored three Baltimore Police Department officers who took the time to go to the library and read to children. They are: Germen Santiago, a trainee from Puerto Rico, David Milburn and Dena T. Roney.