On the last day of February in 1980, Charlotte Lesser saw a newspaper headline that grabbed her attention. “A Streak of Stealing That Just Won’t Stop,” the Daily Breeze headline read, atop a story about 111 burglaries that had occurred within Manhattan Beach in the previous month.
Neither the news of the crimes themselves nor the part that said “just won’t stop” settled well with Lesser. She is not given to apathy, and so Lesser had an immediate idea how to take action.
At the time, Lesser was the PTA president for Robinson Elementary, and at a regional PTA conference she had learned of a program initiated by the State Office of Criminal Justice Planning that enlisted the community in crime prevention. It was called Neighborhood Watch. Lesser thought it sounded like the perfect idea for addressing what was occurring in Manhattan Beach.
“Why don’t we have a Neighborhood Watch here?” she asked her husband, Russ Lesser, who was two years into his first team as a city councilman.
Russ Lesser brought the matter to council, since Neighborhood Watch would require a partnership with the MBPD. The discussion stalled briefly, but a month later he returned home after a council meeting with good news. The council had voted to initiate the program in Manhattan Beach.
It was time to make a game plan and then make that plan happen.
“Let’s see if I push this,” she said, “and something wonderful happens.”
The Lessers and three MBPD reserve officers researched communities in Orange County and San Diego where Neighborhood Watch had been implemented.
“We knew we had three kinds of responsibilities that we needed — to take to the [neighborhood] blocks information about how to mutually work together, how to protect your home and keep safe, and, if you’ve got somebody on the street who shouldn’t be there or has perpetrated a crime, how you describe that suspicion, or that person,” Charlotte Lesser said. “So we put the program together.”
They organized a community meeting for late April and put the word out through the local newspapers, as well as word of mouth. Expectations were low.
“We thought, oh, two or three people would come out,” Lesser said at a TEDx MB event at the Joslyn Center in 2010. “Well, we had about 400 people here in this room wanting to know what they could do.”
Neighborhood Watch fanned out across the city. The three police reserve officers, along with five volunteer neighborhood coordinators, including Lesser, conducted two meetings per night every Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday for the next three years, explaining the program and enlisting more volunteers. They went to “every meeting they could think of,” Lesser recalled, including PTA, AYSO, and Soroptimist Club meetings. By the end of those three years, they’d reached 85 percent of the community, and Neighborhood Watch — with its block captains, close communication and cooperation with MBPD, and perhaps most essentially, between community members — had emerged as a potent force for crime prevention.
“By the end of those three years, we were wearing buttons that said ‘22,’” Lesser said at her TED talk. “That’s how many burglaries we had in the month of February three years later.”
Forty-five years later, the Neighborhood Watch program is both a proud part of the City’s history and an ongoing, indispensable tool for not only keeping Manhattan Beach safer, but also for creating the bonds that tie the community together. Over 400 volunteers are active in the program, which has involved thousands of citizens across the decades.
Former councilperson Richard Montgomery said Lesser and her “top lieutenant” Millie Newton, who has since passed away, seemed to be omnipresent as they spread Neighborhood Watch.
“Those two were everywhere — everywhere — in the city,” he said. “Every block, getting block captains signed up, telling people what the advantage was, making your block safe. There was a motto, ‘One block at a time.’ They were out there recruiting people. No one had heard of it before, and all of a sudden it took off in the city. Now we have an organized system of block captains, and once a month the police go talk about making your home safe, what to look for in emergencies, what to do. Charlotte really created a blueprint for the city of Manhattan Beach.”
Mayor Pro Tem David Lesser (no relation to Russ and Charlotte) said that Neighborhood Watch has helped bind the community together.
“Beyond the effectiveness of what Manhattan Beach Neighborhood Watch has achieved in its 45 years, the real secret sauce has been Charlotte and her persistence and her graciousness in bringing neighbors together,” he said.
“I’ve been the liaison for the program on and off during my years on council since 2011 and I’ve been a member since 2005, and what I’ve noticed about her in leading these meetings….You know, the subject matter itself is a little tough, with people being fearful about crime and what they need to do to protect themselves, but she’s turned that around into sort of positive community that feels good about contributing their time in basically supporting our police department.”
“I want to correct one thing,” he said. “It’s not so secret a sauce, because others see this. It is not that Charlotte is behind the scenes. She’s quite prominent, and it has really bound this organization together for 45 years.”
Lesser is retiring from her leadership of Neighborhood Watch. A celebration is taking place honoring her contributions to the program tonight at the Joslyn Center at 6 p.m.
Mayor Amy Howorth said that though Lesser typically deflects attention, this moment, 45 years in the making, is finally a time to put a spotlight on what she has accomplished.
Charlotte Lesser is the person everyone hopes is in their community,” Howorth said. “Unlike us politicians, she’s very quiet about what she does. But she deserves recognition for what she has done for our community, not just in Neighborhood Watch, but countless other things as well. Neighborhood Watch has not only helped us feel safer, but it’s also connected us to each other in meaningful ways…In this day and age, when people may not be out in their neighborhoods as much as they used to be, Neighborhood Watch is one of the only methods for getting people out together, to know each other, and to know their neighborhood.”
Typical of how she has led the organization, Lesser’s celebration is taking place at a regularly scheduled Neighborhood Watch town hall. The posters advertising the event do not mention her name.
Former councilperson and six-time mayor Steve Napolitano said that perhaps the most essential part of what Lesser has done has been to build a program that isn’t dependent on her.
“Sure, both Charlotte and Russ started it, but Charlotte stuck with it to make it what it is today,” Napolitano said. “She’s done an incredible job, but she also knows better than anyone that Neighborhood Watch isn’t about any one person, it’s about all of us working together. Charlotte has worked with anyone and everyone to expand the program, which has been her superpower over the years. She has the power to make others say yes like nobody else. She also knows when to hand off the baton, and she’s set the example for everyone who follows. God Bless Charlotte Lesser, few people can say they’ve done as much to make MB safer for everyone.”
Howorth said Lesser has a rare combination of kindliness and utter clarity of purpose — in other words, she is able to provide direction for others because her own is so clear.
“When I talk about competency or capability, it’s that steeliness,” Howorth said. “And I don’t mean that negatively, at all. You know she’s right. Resistance is futile.”
Councilperson Joe Franklin said beyond getting people to say yes, Lesser has the rare gift to instill purpose in others.
“You know those people who talk with you and then they develop expectations in you? You don’t want to disappoint them, right?” Franklin said. “Charlotte does this in a very velvet glove kind of way. She motivates you to become part of the team. And then you become part of it, and everybody’s the better for it. She’s articulate, and she lives it — she’s a living example of caring for the community.”
Russ Lesser knows about the velvet glove.
“Tell me about it,” he said. “I’ve been married to her for 60 years.”
But even after six decades by her side, Lesser still sounds somewhat in awe of his wife. He said his own involvement with Neighborhood Watch was just at its beginning, and then noted that what his wife has built has become a program modelled by others nationwide. He rattled off several of the recognitions Charlotte has received for her work with the program.
“She was South Bay Citizen of the Year, Manhattan Beach Citizen of the Year, LA County Woman of the Year for all the work she did,” he said. “Anyway, I am kind of proud of her.”
Lesser has played a vital role in the community both during his two terms on City Council and through involvement in everything from the co-founding of the Manhattan Beach 10k to serving on the MB Chamber board. He’s been an influential voice in city leadership for four decades. But Howorth said that his influence is equaled by that of his wife, who has been both his partner in life and in the life of the community.
“I’ve been in awe of Charlotte Lesser as long as I’ve been involved in this community, because if there was something good that was being done, she was involved with it,” Howorth said. “Russ Lesser is more well known for being a councilmember and mayor. But she was right there, and not just beside him, supporting him, but she was right there making things happen….She is just really incredible. She is able to get things done and not be dramatic about it, and certainly doing things not for her own ego or recognition.”
Russ Lesser also pointed to another aspect of Neighborhood Watch that will be a part of Charlotte’s lasting legacy — the bond it created not only with neighbors better knowing each other, but with the community knowing its police department.
“The policeman became the friend who helps you, not the person who gives you the speeding ticket,” he said. “How many cities across the country, after the riots in the summer of 2020, put signs all over their city saying ‘We support our PD?’ Over 700 signs were on homes all over town.”
In an interview, Charlotte Lesser said that though her intent from the beginning was to serve the community, the reward has outweighed her contribution — the simple but gratifying knowledge that Neighborhood Watch has made this a better place to live.
“One does something like this for the benefit of others,” Lesser said. “I felt my involvement, people skills, talents, and my organizational skills would benefit the community, and involve the community and connect. And so yes I received a lot more from that — I mean, we made a big difference. We had to learn how to do that from the police department by being educated and continually supported. And so it’s been very gratifying that over time, we’ve been able to do that.”
The connection between neighbors that the program fostered has helped prevent crime but also created community fabric. That, Lesser said, is the most essential element of Neighborhood Watch.
“Because we’ve got all the bells and whistles in our homes and our electronic devices,” Lesser said. “You name it, we get all the information, if we choose to, directly on our phones, such as the weekly updates on crime. And what we don’t get, and what’s the only way, is looking out for one another. Simple things like, I just put trash cans away for a neighbor whom I knew was working. The reason I do that is because I care about them, number one, but number two, that would be a signal if the trash cans were still out that no one was home and they were fair game from a burglar’s standpoint. It’s simple things like that in which the fabric of the community benefited. We have a more small town feel as a result, because we know who’s who. I feel good about that part of it, and I hope that continues into the future. We have a good team coming in, people who also care, and are willing to work to improve.”
One of the things Neighborhood Watch has given even Lesser herself is a greater feeling of connection and safety within the community.
“I can’t even begin to tell you how many friends I’ve made throughout, and I reached out to people I knew already,” she said. “Many of them said, ‘Okay, I’ll do it. I’ll do it for you.’ Well, eventually, hopefully you’ll do it for the community, and that’s really what happened. I also made wonderful friends in the police department itself, police officers, sergeants, lieutenants, all of the chiefs. Over time, I hardly can remember their last names, because we were on a first name basis. Plus, the City Council has been terrifically supportive of the program, and of me particularly, but also of all the people who are involved. So it’s a triumvirate of the police, the city council and the volunteer effort, and I benefit from all three.”
While all the MBPD liaisons with the program have been essential to its success, Lt. Andy Herrod was one of its constants.
“He’s just retiring after 50 years of his involvement with the Manhattan Beach Police Department,” Lesser said, noting that her familiarity with MBPD is reflective of how the department has integrated with the community. “It’s just truly beneficial to the community to see a police officer and wave hello. I mean, just even that simple thing gives you a sense of, ‘You’re my protector, and I know you, and I can say thank you by a wave.’ It’s terrific.”
One of the quiet miracles of Manhattan Beach is that even after undergoing radical change over the last decades in which over 60 percent of the population has turned over, it has indeed retained its core sense of community. Lesser said as that change accelerates, an organization like Neighborhood Watch remains a common thread.
“I think one of the keys in this modern, more electronic, more social media savvy time, is how do you reach people who are younger and busy, as we all were with kids and work and so forth?” she said. “Reaching out with that message is extremely important, so in that way you engage and include more of the newcomers to the community, of which there are lots. We’ve gained a whole cadre of folks who have come from terrible circumstances, the [Pacific Palisades] fires and the sliding earth up in Palos Verdes. We do have new people who need nurturing, need caring, need connection. And I think that we can offer that here, as long as we reach out and welcome them into the community.”
Lesser believes the time is right for her to step away from Neighborhood Watch, but of course this does not signal an end to her community involvement. She’s already working on another project. Like Neighborhood Watch, and another organization it has increasingly worked in tandem with, the Citizen’s Emergency Response Team, the new project links emergency preparedness with community connection. It is called Map Your Neighborhood.
“It’s a program that gives you three things. One is what you do immediately if, say, you have a big, disastrous earthquake,” she said. “You assess who’s on the block and what kind of help they need, and then know ahead of time if you have people who have special needs, or special skills that can benefit. Because you’re not going to get your police department, your fire department, Public Works, paramedics — none of that is going to be available to you. You’re going to have to kind of get along for a while, and we don’t know how long that ‘while’ will be. So this Map Your Neighborhood program is to help blocks collaborate among themselves, to figure out and be prepared ahead of time.”
Lesser said her final pitch to folks interested in Neighborhood Watch is to simply go online, say yes, and sign up. You might not know how this simple act will have positive impacts for both your community and yourself.
“I think it’s important for people to be involved,” Lesser said. “It doesn’t take a life commitment. I’m a unique individual in that. But what it does is help one another.”
Charlotte Lesser will be honored Wednesday, April 2 at the Manhattan Beach Joslyn Center, from 6 to 7 p.m. John Braitman will be introduced as the new Neighborhood Watch Director. For more about Neighborhood Watch visit ManhattanBeach.gov. ER
