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“We’ve got more police officers on the street than we’ve had in this city,” Turner said.

“We need more,” Unterman replied. Residents pointed to a series of car break-ins and reports of home invasions and said they had seen reports on social media of people driving through their neighborhoods as if scouting houses for possible thefts. Others said outsiders would knock on their doors, as if to see whether anyone would answer.

Lindsey Yarborough told the officials a man came to her door pretending to sell magazines and kept trying to get in for 10 minutes after she called 911. “He stood at my door for 10 minutes and did everything he could to gain access to my home,” she said.

The man was released on bond and faces a court hearing later this month on a charge of soliciting without a license, she said. “The reality is he committed a crime that was much worse than what he’s charged with,” she said.

One resident said she didn’t sleep well because of her fears about crime in the community. Another shouted a question from the back of the room asking if she could shoot strangers at her door. “Not for knocking on your door,” Turner replied.

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Another resident held up a computer printout that he said showed a dramatic increase in some types of crime in Zone 2.

“Rape is up 50 percent in Zone 2,” he said. “I want to know what you’re going to do in Zone 2 about rape! ... Long-term [solutions] we heard about. But what are going to do about the short term? Short term, what are we going to do... to stop the madness?”

Hobbs said the rape statistics did not show the full picture. The increase in reports was from 13 to 18, he said. Some of those assaults were crimes that were reported this year, but did not occur this year, he said. Others involved people who knew one another or had been together socially before the attack. Only a single report involved a stranger-on-stranger attack.

“One [rape] is too many,” he said, “but we don’t have a serial rapist running around.”

Still, residents said they did not feel safe in their neighborhoods.

“There is a feeling of being a sitting duck,” one resident said.