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HUNTINGTON -- For Aimee Slash Chapman, the success of Huntington's Weed and Seed program weighs heavily on communication.

The lifelong Fairfield West resident said city officials have the difficult task of showing the crime-plagued community that the effort goes beyond law enforcement patrols.

"The city has to spread the message to this community that this is a two-part project," said Chapman, a relationship counselor who also mentors young people in Fairfield West. "Everyone tends to focus on the negative aspects of Fairfield West such as crime and drugs, but rarely do we hear about what we can do to build on the positive pillars of our community."

In a nutshell, the Weed and Seed program aims to accomplish exactly what its name implies: Weeding out violent crime and drug activity and seeding in a plethora of neighborhood revitalization and social support programs.

It's not that law enforcement officials have never tried to crack down on Fairfield West or that the city has never attempted to make the neighborhood a thriving area again. Previous attempts, however, were not coordinated and sought little input from residents, Chapman said.

"I'm a believer this time around, because it's going to give the community a voice," she said. "We will be able to express what we think will work and what we need."

The city applied for and received a $1 million grant from the U.S. Department of Justice's Weed and Seed initiative last fall. The funding will funnel into the city over a five-year period. Appropriations will start small in the first two years, peak in the third year and decline in years four and five. The "bell-curve" funding formula, as city officials have described it, will prepare Huntington to absorb the law enforcement and neighborhood revitalization programs into its budget when federal funding ceases.

The funding will be applied to an area between 8th and 28th streets between 2nd Avenue and as far south as 13th Avenue and Roby Road. The target area represents only 7 percent of the city's size and 20 percent of its population, but it has accounted for at least 50 percent of various crimes in the city in recent years.

Setting up the program thus far has centered on the former Barnett Child Care Center building at the corner of 10th Avenue and Hal Greer Boulevard. That's where the Huntington Police Department will put a field office and share the building with Tim White, who was hired as the city's Weed and Seed program coordinator in December.

The city, which has owned the building for years, had utilities restored a few weeks ago. Some Fairfield West children and a group of high school students from Minnesota helped paint, clean and landscape around the building on Saturday. It should be ready for use by the end of the month, White said.

"The neighbors and businesses in the area are behind this 100 percent," he said. "I even had a gentleman stop his car in the middle of 10th Avenue so he could walk up to me and shake my hand."

The Weed and Seed portion of the building will offer a computer lab and a multi-purpose room that White envisions will be used for community meetings, after-school tutoring and job training classes. Support services and youth committees have been established to identify programming, and input also is being sought from seniors and business owners, he said.

White also hopes to start a community garden behind the building and set up a small playground area.

The Salvation Army has donated at least $8,000 worth of furniture, while Lowe's, Sears and Sherwin-Williams have donated about $6,000 worth of paint, White said.

"We want to try and save every dime we can in setting the building up," he said. "It's saving money that we can put back into the community."

The building also will house the Police Department's K-9 unit. The unit, which now has three dogs, is a perfect fit for the building because the back is fenced-in, Police Chief Skip Holbrook said.

The field office also will serve as a hub for the bicycle patrol and the department's special emphasis unit, which will target street crimes and other community problems, he said. The unit now consists of a supervisor and two officers, but Holbrook hopes to double the size in next year's budget. In the meantime, the department will use money from a $25,000 federal grant for overtime costs to help supplement the unit.

The Weed and Seed program has provided funding for Cabell County to hire an assistant prosecutor whose sole responsibility will be to prosecute gun and drug crimes in the designated area. The assistant prosecutor, Joe Adams, also has been given the designation as an assistant U.S. attorney so he can prosecute crimes on the federal level. It's the first time a cross-designation of this nature has occurred in Cabell County, Holbrook said.

"This is critical to our enforcement efforts in the Weed and Seed area," he said. "We will be able to prosecute cases that typically might slip through the cracks."

Eventually, the Police Department will host what Holbrook calls a citizens' police academy at the field office. The weekly class will educate citizens about Police Department policies and law enforcement tactics, he said.

"From my point of view, the Weed and Seed program is about the Police Department forming partnerships with residents to develop the community rather than simply eradicating a drug house and moving on to the next reported crime," Holbrook said. "If we do this the right way, we will change Fairfield forever in Huntington and will be a glowing example that other cities will replicate."

AP Video

Mark Webb/The Herald-Dispatch

Volunteers work to prepare the new headquarters for the Weed and Seed program on Saturday, Feb. 14, 2009, at the old Barnett Child Care Center building.

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