Beach Haven Police Department actively cares for seniors and disabled residents with ‘Operation Safe Call’

The safety of its summer and year-round residents has always been at the forefront of the Beach Haven Police Department’s active duties. Checking on vacant homes while residents are away for short or even extended periods of time has always been on the roster, but caring for each individual presently living in the area is just as important, too.

Photo via everythinglagrange
The program offers an extra pair of watchful eyes
for individuals who are living alone.

Now in its 15th year, “Operation Safe Call” offers an extra pair of watchful eyes for seniors and disabled residents who are living alone. The year-round program allows qualified residents to check in with BG Braun, the receptionist at the police department, who has been heading the program since it was implemented by now-retired Lt. Chuck Fastige in 1999.

“We were getting a lot of check-the-welfare calls, and he (Fastige) came up with this idea to have the residents start calling us,” remembered Matthew Greenwood, captain of the Beach Haven Police Department. “Family members would call up and say, ‘Hey, I haven’t heard from my mom or my dad for a couple days, and they’re not answering the phone. They live alone; can you go check on them?’ Then we’d have to go over to the house, and find the homeowner, and tell them, ‘Hey, the kids are trying to call you.’ So we decided, ‘How about we just start having them call us every day and check on us?’”

Operation Safe Call participants are required to call in on a daily basis during a specific allotted time, between 7 and 9 a.m.

“If we don’t hear from them, usually by 10 o’clock we start making phone calls, trying to track them down, or we send somebody to the house,” said Greenwood.

He claimed the program has helped the team save the lives of many residents who, after missing their daily phone call, were found to have fallen in the middle of the night.

“We’ve actually had to go and pick some people up who couldn’t get to the phone and don’t have the Life Alert around their necks. Their car’s in the driveway, we get into the house, find them laying somewhere – in the bathroom, in the hallway – and get them the medical attention that they need,” he explained.

To help keep the team up-to-date on a resident’s whereabouts, registered participants should inform a member of the police department if they are going away on vacation, visiting family members or friends, or even checking into the hospital.

Residents interested in signing up for the program must fill out a required form, which can be mailed or faxed in, or picked up at the police station. An officer will also deliver the form to persons who are unable to drive. For more information, visit beachhaven-nj.gov, or call Braun at 609-492-0505.

— Kelley Anne Essinger


This article was published in The SandPaper.