Montgomery County has announced $1.2 million in grants will go toward nonprofits and faith-based organizations to boost security and deter hate crimes.
The grants can be used to add or expand security services, upgrade security planning or training and add new security cameras.
Since 2019, the county said it’s committed more than $4.1 million for security grants.
Starting this year, the grant funding can be applied to the county’s “MoCoConnect” program, in which owners of security cameras can register them with the Montgomery County Police Department.
“Registering your cameras does not allow the Montgomery County Police Department access to your live video stream 鈥� it only enables investigators to know a camera is present at your location and easily request video evidence should an incident occur,” according to the county’s registration website.
Data from the Montgomery County Police Department’s from 2024 shows 483 incidents were reported, and that 60% of them were, in the words of the report, “school-related.”
The data from the 2024 report shows that 45% of the bias incidents involved “verbal intimidation,” 11% involved “written intimidation” and 11% involved simple assault. According to the data, 43% of the reported bias incidents involved religion 鈥� 39% were antisemitic and 2% were Islamophobic.
Ron Halber, CEO of the Jewish Community Relations Council of Greater Washington, told WTOP he’s not surprised to see so many of the incidents come under the “school-related” category.
“The polarization of American society, the rise of hatred in public discourse, has created a fertile ground for this time of hate,” Halber said. “And the kids, they see this, and it feeds itself.”
He said the way public officials speak about each other would have been unacceptable in the past.
“We live in a community that respects diversity as a part of the fabric of community and makes resources available to make sure that all residents are safe regardless of their background,” Halber added, referring to the work Montgomery County does to combat hate and bias incidents. “If the people of this country refuse to participate in hatred and bigotry and look at each other and open our hearts up and just tone down the rhetoric a little bit, it’ll be transformational.”
A new was established in December, along with a telephone hotline.
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