My colleague, Baltimore Sun police reporter Justin Fenton, attended a community meeting last night in Southeast Baltimore. On the agenda: prostitutes and a recent murder in Canton. Here is his report:

The numbers don't mean much to Maj. Roger Bergeron.

At the first Southeastern District Police Community Relations Council meeting of the year, he said he's happy about reductions in homicides (43 percent), shootings (35 percent), and rapes. But he said he knows that those numbers are of little solace to those experiencing break-ins, vandalism or seeing prostitutes in their neighborhood. Bergeron said he hopes his officers this year will forge even stronger ties on their posts.

Among the initiatives he hopes to put in place this year is a full-time liaison to the community's burgeoning Latino population. Bergeron, who speaks fluent Spanish, said there has been a significant increase in Spanish speakers in the area over the past three years - and conversely, a rise in the number of victims of crime who are uncomfortable or unable to talk to police.

He created a new post in the O'Donnell Heights neighborhood in 2007 in response to several disturbing shootings and homicides, and there was only one shooting there last year. He expects to add two more posts this year.

And Bergeron said he wants to tackle the issue of prostitution, increasing sweeps and looking for women with open warrants. He said he doesn't like the idea discussed recently in the Southern District of sending letters to suspected Johns informing them that they were spotted in high-prostitution areas, saying the potential for error could be extremely harmful to the innocent. But he does want to turn up the heat on those who are confirmed to be engaging in prostitution, suggesting that their names be published in the newspaper as a form of embarassment for them and their families. (Former Mayor Kurt L. Schmoke proposed this in the mid-1990s -- singling out Johns -- but gave up after he learned city cops had only arrested two men on prostitution charges over a three-month period).

If he can come up with the funding, the major wants also start a so-called "John School," a program where first-time male offenders are told of the negative consequences of prostitution on neighborhoods, the criminal justice system and prostitutes themselves. Programs are currently in several cities, including Washington. Bergeron suggested the program could be funded here through court fines imposed on johns.

The Southeastern District was where York County, Pa. politician and former police officer Michael Johnson Jr. allegedly went on Nov. 2 to target prostitutes. Posing as an officer, police said Johnson picked up a woman - who claimed not to be a prostitute - on S. Conkling St. and said he would arrest her if she did not have sex with him.  Johnson would later be charged with committing two similar rapes in York, and fled when local authorities gave him the option of turning himself in. With federal marshals closing in, he committed suicide on Dec. 22 in Albany, NY.

Bergeron talked briefly about a Dec. 23 homicide in Canton. Police said 22-year-old Alaina Ciara High was shot in the head and dumped in the 800 block of S. Bouldin St., and a vehicle was seen leaving the scene. Few details have been released, but High had several drug arrests and Bergeron said "she lived a pretty hard life, for sure." As for Canton residents concerned about the incident, Bergeron said she did not have any ties to the neighborhood and said the location was likely chosen because it was quiet and not heavily policed.

"We've got some leads, but nothing concrete," he said.