While many law enforcement agencies in the United States have slowly embraced social media by releasing news alerts on Facebook and Twitter, the Alhambra Police Department in southern California is the first to open an account on Sina Weibo.
The department's Weibo page currently delivers local crime and community-related news in Chinese and has attracted a motley crew of followers, including overseas Chinese living in Alhambra city, their relatives on the mainland and curious onlookers who have decided to follow the page for the sheer novelty of seeing a US police agency operate Chinese social media.
“We’ve opened this microblog in order to better serve Chinese residents of the region – everyone from students to businessmen and tourists,” a description on the Weibo page reads. “We would like to eliminate misunderstandings and improve communication with Chinese residents so that new immigrants can integrate into the community as soon as possible…
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“[Alhambra] is a cosmopolitan and diverse city, and [the Alhambra Police Department] hopes to help our community and maintain a close relationship with the public.”
Mark Yokoyama. Photo: SCMP Pictures
Although this is the first time a US law enforcement agency has used Weibo, Alhambra seems to be the perfect testing ground for this experiment. According to US Census data from three years ago, over 50 per cent of Alhambra’s population is Asian, and about 30,000 of the city’s 57,300 residents are Chinese.
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“I feel that we’re not reaching out to [Chinese immigrants] as much as we should,” Alhambra police chief Mark Yokoyama said during a December 9 press conference when the Weibo page was first revealed, local news portal Alhambra Source reported. “If we increase that engagement [on Sina Weibo], [and] if we increase that communication [and] that trust, I truly believe we’ll have an impact on public safety in our community.”
In an interview with Southern California Public Radio, the police chief added that this “increased engagement” would allow Chinese immigrants who might not be fluent in English to receive and contribute tips on crime prevention from Weibo.
