At 12:20 p.m., Sr. Cpl. Rick Janich and Reserve Officer Tony Metcalfe turn their patrol bikes west onto Live Oak from Munger.
They are greeted by a group of young men, one of which is standing in white boxer shorts with his tan pants pulled down in front of an apartment complex.
Janich and Metcalfe stop their bikes to do their job.
They run an ID check on the 18-year-old.
The young man challenges Metcalfe.
“Y’all must have nothing better to do,” he says.
“When you’re standing out here with your pants unzipped, it looks odd,” Metcalfe says.
The young man says his pants were unzipped because he had just gotten out of bed.
His name comes back from the dispatcher with no noted warrants or prior arrests. Janich write his real name and street name down in a small pad and lets him go.
Janich suspects the man has drugs in his boxer shorts, but he doesn’t have probably cause to search. Janich also suspects the man is a member of a gang.
The officers may not have gotten him this day, but Janich says one day, they probably will catch him red-handed.
“I know we’ll get him,” Janich says.
For two-and-a-half years, Rick Janich has patrolled a southwestern portion of our neighborhood. He and the other patrol officers out of the East Dallas Storefront constantly deal with people the rest of us would rather not meet.
But that is the job of the two bicycle patrolmen stationed at the East Dallas Police Storefront. The Storefront officers patrol an area bounded by Ross, R.L. Thornton, Haskell and Lakewood Shopping Center.
“A majority of the neighborhoods in this area are quiet,” Janich says. But the small area he works is not.
The Storefront officers see the good sometimes, but mostly they run across the bad and the ugly everyday.
They are the ones we call with problems ranging from a loud neighbor, an unethical landlord, a robbery or a death. They help make us feel safer in our homes and on our streets.
The Advocate recently spent a day with Janich and Metcalfe to see what it’s like being an officer in our neighborhoods.
Their job is scary, gratifying, frustrating, at times humorous, and other times downright depressing. But the job is never boring.
Here’s a look at the neighborhoods they see.
10 a.m.
Janich and Metcalfe prepare for their patrol at the East Dallas Storefront, 1327 N. Peak at Bryan.
Janich has been with the department for 12 years and is part of the bike patrol. He came to the Storefront from the police recruitment department.
“This has been fun,” he says. “You kind of learn the ins and learn the outs and who’s out there and why they’re out there.”
Janich and most police officers aren’t in the job for the money – their starting salary is $23,901 to $25,101. The receive raises when the City Council approves them or for a promotion.
“No one is going to be a millionaire doing this,” Janich says.
Most officers with families work second jobs to make ends meet and easily put in 60 to 80 hours a week. Burn out is high.
But despite the low pay, high stress and long hours, Janich loves his job.
“I wouldn’t do any other job any other place,” Janich says.
10:45 a.m.
Janich and Metcalfe leave the Storefront and pedal east on Bryan. They point to Saber Park, which is a small park fenced-in by a black, wrought-iron gate in the heart of their beat.
Normally, the park is filled with children playing soccer and on the playground equipment. A few days ago, the officers arrested a 17-year-old with a sawed-off shotgun standing in the middle of the park.
Despite the life-threatening situations he gets into and the repeat criminals he deals with every day, Janich sees the streets of East Dallas as a chance to help.
When he was in recruiting, he says he always heard the same thing from job candidates.
“I want to make a difference,” Janich says. “That’s a good attitude to have, until you get out on the street. You won’t make a difference worldwide.”
But Janich says officers can help at least one person everyday on the streets – at least, that’s the goal, and that’s why he wants to be a patrol officer.
11 a.m.
As Janich and Metcalfe come up an alley behind an apartment building on Worth at Prairie, they see a woman who has a history of prostitution and drug use walk up to a blue truck and talk to the driver.
The officers bee-line for the truck.
The woman tells them she is in the neighborhood visiting friends and is just saying hi to the man, even though she doesn’t know him.
After checking their identification, the officers tell them to leave and stay out of trouble.
“It just looks suspicious,” Janich says. “It gives us a right to stop and ask questions.”
Janich remembers the woman from past incidences. Matter of fact, he remembers most people he runs across on the streets, pulling their backgrounds from his memory – a 15-year-old who was the father of two babies who Janich picked up as a run-away, or a young woman he arrested for outstanding tickets and told him where a drug house was in the neighborhood.
11:45 a.m
The officers make a pass by an apartment building at Hubert and Matilda and wave to people standing outside on a second-floor balcony. Janich and Metcalfe know it is a drug house. They patrol it frequently – riding through the courtyard and talking to neighbors.
As they ride through the neighborhood, Janich and Metcalfe point to houses and empty lots where drug houses used to be. There used to be quite a few, Janich says, but a lot have been shut down.
“This neighborhood is getting safer,” Janich says. “In the two years I’ve been out here, I’ve seen a lot of changes for the better.”
Pam Stephenson, president of the Vickery Place Neighborhood Association, says a lot of the neighborhood improvements can be attributed to Janich and the other officers at the East Dallas Storefront.
When Janich’s shift is over, his effort at stopping crime in our neighborhoods doesn’t end. He attends neighborhood meetings and parties and coached a neighborhood basketball team last summer.
“I think he has a vision of a safe, clean neighborhood, whether it be Vickery Place or Junius Heights,” Stephenson says.
And if it means being on the streets, working with people the rest of us would rather not deal with, Janich will do it, Stephenson says.
“I think Rick is absolutely dedicated to the community,” Stephenson says. “We’re lucky to have him at the Storefront.”
3 p.m.
After riding 18 miles, Janich and Metcalfe switch to a patrol car. On the computer in their car, they bring up calls that have come in to the dispatcher. There is a death threat, a burglar alarm, a fight, an abandoned vehicle in a parking lot, a stalled truck on the highway.
Last year, more than one million calls were answered by the Dallas Police Department. In East Dallas, it’s mainly disturbance calls, which is anything from domestic violence to someone playing loud music. At night, most of the calls tend to involve family violence, and during the day it’s suspicious person and burglar alarm calls, Janich says.
5:40 p.m.
The last call. A wreck at Ross and Prairie. A woman hit another car while watching police cars race by to another wreck. The front end of her forest green Toyota looks like an accordion.
Her two daughters also are in the car, and one is slightly injured. Janich and Metcalfe take a report and follow the woman to ensure she is OK to drive.
Once she waves to them, Janich and Metcalfe drive back to the Storefront.
It’s hard to count how many people they came in contact with this day, and even harder to count how many people’s lives they affected by pounding the streets of our neighborhoods.
“That’s where I’ll find that one person that I can make a difference with,” Janich says.
