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An aggressive city-wide effort at curfew enforcement begins tonight, when six police officers will be out questioning and arresting juveniles who are on the streets after 10 p.m.

"We're going after a lot of things that are disrupting our neighborhoods," police Chief Bryan Washowich says.

For the last four weeks, police have been issuing curfew warnings, but tonight, they're making arrests, he says.

"We're trying to be civil and understanding," Washowich says. "It's tough (for kids), because it is hot out, and there are a lot of people who are hanging out on their front or back porches."

. . .

But police have received complaints from many neighborhoods about teens making noise and disturbing other residents.

Many of those reports have come in on the police department's new "silent complaint forms," which can be picked up at city hall or the Weed and Seed Office at 617 Sinclair St. (The forms may also be downloaded from Tube City Online.)

Based on those forms, Washowich says, "we have a list of different areas we are going to be targeting."

. . .

The curfew enforcement isn't designed to penalize children, but to send a message to their parents to bring their kids under control, Mayor James Brewster says.

"I've talked to a lot of kids since I've been mayor, maybe 2,000 of them, and a lot of them are good kids," he says. "Our goal is not to arrest these kids, but we've got to get the attention of their parents."

"We need to start enforcing all of the tools that we have available to us," Brewster says.

. . .

Several of those tools have a high-tech flavor. City police will soon begin using the free Nixle service to send crime alerts and emergency warnings via email and cell phone, Washowich says.

Residents who want to be automatically notified of an emergency should go to Nixle's website to register. The service is free, but messages sent to cell phones will carry the phone company's usual texting costs, if any.

Police agencies from Santa Cruz, Calif., to Amarillo, Texas, and New Haven, Conn., are already using Nixle, according to the company's website. In Fayetteville, N.C., police credit Nixle with helping them to nab three fugitives already, the Fayetteville, N.C., Observer reported last month.

. . .

Unlike Twitter or other social-networking services, only municipalities and public safety agencies may use Nixle, which should keep it free of advertising, "spam" and other junk messages.

But what Washowich called "positive" messages --- updates about city news or events --- can also be distributed using the service. The police chief says he will personally approve all public-safety messages, while other alerts will be approved by Brewster.

City police also this week launched a Facebook page.

"The police department is trying to reach out in every way to the community," Washowich says.

. . .

Update: It's not just city residents who can sign up for Nixle, because the McKeesport police department isn't the only local agency using the service.

T.C. Tiger just signed up, and he found police from White Oak, Port Vue, North Huntingdon and Pleasant Hills are among the participants. If you live in any Mon-Yough community, give Nixle a try. You can register your cell phone, email or both.

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