LAST August, more than 300 residents gathered at the municipal stadium here in a driving rain for a rally to whip up enthusiasm for National Night Out -- an annual event in which residents of communities across the country gather at block parties to demonstrate their concern about combating crime.

The next evening, 5,000 residents, more than 16 percent of the population of 30,000, took part in the Night Out. It was the second largest turnout of any community of its size in the nation.

For some years now, the people here have had good reason to be worried about crime. In 1984, for example, there were 108.6 crimes per thousand residents, the worst per-capita crime rate in Essex County; the figure for neighboring East Orange that year was 86.7, and for Newark, 102.5. In 1991, Orange had nine homicides, the same number as East Orange, whose population is almost two and a half times larger.

Since 1987, more than 1,000 motor vehicles have been stolen annually, and last year, one of those was a State Police patrol car, stolen from in front of the trooper's home. Joan K. Carr, the former director of welfare, has special knowledge of the problem. During one two-month period, she had two cars stolen from the municipal parking lot behind City Hall. Police Form a Task Force.

Over the years, the Police Department has tried a variety of approaches to cut back the crime rates. When a series of 12 drive-by shootings occurred in a two-week period last year, leading to two deaths, the police formed the Street Crime Attack Team. Ten officers were detached to concentrate on these and other street-level offenses, with three officers per patrol car as a means of discouraging suspects from threatening or attacking officers. The drive-by crimes ceased, but burglaries last year rose by 21 percent, and the overall number of crimes reported went up 3 percent.

Orange has joined the growing number of communities that are putting police officers on bicycles. There are three officers now on bikes with plans to have as many as 10. "It's not as impersonal as a patrol car," said Police Director Charles Cobbertt, "but it's faster and more mobile than foot patrol."

The use of neighborhood associations to help combat crime, first undertaken in 1978, has recently been given a higher priority. "The association members act as the eyes and ears of the police," said Lieut. Donald Wactor, who is in charge of the Crime Prevention Bureau. "This is the cornerstone of any crime-fighting effort in this community."

There are 22 associations today, the highest number ever. Four times a year, the leaders of each association attend a meeting devoted to discussing the role their members can play in aiding the police by keeping an eye on their neighborhoods and reporting suspicious activities.

At a recent meeting, for example, an Essex County officer described the steps the county has been taking to halt auto theft and urged the association leaders to keep an eye out for strange cars in their neighborhoods. The leaders then return to their groups and pass along the information they have been given.

Robert Brown, the Mayor of Orange, said the network of associations has another benefit for the community. "It brings people together who might normally live for years next door to someone and not communicate," he said. "I'm 45 years old. When I was growing up, everybody knew each other -- it was no big thing. Now they can grow up living next door to someone and never get to meet them."

One promising new development, police officials say, is the prospect of moving out of their headquarters in an old, rodent-infested school building to a modern structure. Groundbreaking for the new building, which will include a Municipal Court, is planned for next January.

The new working environment, Mr. Cobbertt said, will greatly improve his officers' morale, which could translate into a substantial reduction in crime. "Whenever you change a police officer's quality of life," he said, "it helps to improve his work habits, and attitude is everything in this business."

Before he took his post five years ago, Mr. Cobbertt said, "the officers expressed their frustration by writing graffiti on the walls and punching holes in the wall of their locker room." He added, "At least there's no graffiti now, and I think the new building will add to that positive feeling."

The new location of the building is also seen by officials as a step toward cutting the crime rate. The current headquarters are in a tree-lined residential neighborhood in the city's South Ward, where the crime rate is relatively low. The new building will be in the East Ward, where most of the crime occurs, and only a few blocks from the central business district.

The East Ward is home to two of the city's four Federal housing projects, and downtown merchants have complained for years that vandalism and burglary are rampant and that drugs are being bought and sold at any given time of day right in front of their stores.Effect of New Headquarters.

Lieutenant Wactor said that the "daily traffic of police officers going in and out" would have a deterent effect in the immediate area of the new headquarters. As to the overall impact on crime in the ward, he said that was difficult to gauge.

Vernon Potter, a 27-year resident who lives near the present headquarters, said he agreed with the need for a new building. "The last several mayors we've had ran on a platform that included the building of a new police complex -- all to no avail," he said. But he was skeptical about the new building's deterrent effect on crime.

The closeness of the current headquarters, he said, has made many neighbors feel a sense of safety, "but most of them have also been burglarized."

Marvin H. Scilken, who has been the director of the Orange Public Library for 29 years, said the relocation of the police and court complex near the central business district would have "a symbolic effect on crime-fighting in the city that should be good."

New headquarters, Mayor Brown said, have been needed for more than 50 years, but the Mayor and the City Council have been "at loggerheads" over how they would be financed and where they would be situated. Now, he said, there is "better communication" between the two.

In the final analysis, he said, the decision to build could not be put off because of a shortage of funds. "We are always going to be financially strapped," he said.

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“Reach Back with One Hand and Pull Someone Else Up With You.”

– Charles C. Cobbertt

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