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NILES — The City of Niles Police Department announced it has joined the Neighbors app in its efforts to connect with residents and improve public safety. Neighbors allows you to share photos, videos and information related to local crime and safety incidents so fellow residents can stay informed.

With its Neighbors account, the NPD can view what local residents have posted publicly to Neighbors and can now chime-in with relevant updates or safety alerts to help residents stay informed. The NPD does not have access to users’ cameras or systems and can only see what users share. 

A Ring device is not required to join Neighbors. Anyone with a smartphone can download the Neighbors App in order to receive updates and have the option to post photos or videos from any device.

Niles Public Safety Director Jim Millin hopes the Neighbors app will be a new way to engage the Niles community.

“I’m hoping it’s just one more avenue,” he said. “In today’s world, everybody’s going tech. That’s how people want to communicate and how they want to partner, so we want to try to stay up to date with that. The old school way of walking around town and just talking to community members or business owners, that worked before we had this; this is the new face-to-face, which seems very awkward to me but this is what the people want. 

“So we’re just trying to stay up with that and do what we can to work with them to try to make Niles a little better and a little safer.”

The NPD encourages readers to spread the word and asks readers to report criminal activity or emergency situations directly to the NPD  by contacting (269) 683-1313 or 9-1-1 for emergencies.