LINCOLN HEIGHTS, Ohio — Nearly every morning for the last month, Jay has been waking up before sunrise to drive around the streets of Lincoln Heights, patrolling neighborhood bus stops to make sure children are getting to school safely.
“We have a very tight community, so all of our kids, they know us,” he said.
But for anyone outside the community, Jay’s presence might be a mystery. He wears a face covering along with tactical vests, and Jay is not his real name, which he asked not to use to prevent harassment from hate groups.
He’s a member of the Lincoln Heights Safety and Watch program, an initiative that started shortly after Feb. 7, when a neo-Nazi group waving swastika flags and shouting racial slurs demonstrated on a highway overpass just on the edge of this majority-Black community about 30 minutes north of Cincinnati.
Officers from Evendale, which borders Lincoln Heights, and the Hamilton County Sheriff’s Office both responded that day. No arrests were made, and Evendale police officers did not take down any names or identifying information from members of the neo-Nazi group, according to the mayor’s office. The Hamilton County Prosecutor’s office is currently investigating the incident to see if criminal charges could be filed.
In a statement, Evendale Mayor Richard Finan said officers’ emphasis on de-escalation “resulted in the incident’s resolution without injuries to any of the persons involved, passersby or law enforcement officers. During this evolving scene, protecting life took priority over immediate identification.” The Evendale Police Department was the first to respond to the incident, which took place on a bridge linking Evendale with Lincoln Heights.
But for Daronce Daniels, the safety and watch group’s spokesperson, the police response was just as alarming as the neo-Nazi appearance, making residents feel they wouldn’t be protected if another hate group were to visit their town.
“They’ve been very clear that if it happens again, they’ll allow it to happen again, that their hands are tied,” Daniels said.
Lincoln Heights residents said the police response to the incident was insufficient, prompting Daniels and other members of the Heights Movement, an existing community empowerment organization, to devise the safety and watch program, which includes armed volunteers wearing tactical gear and face coverings. Some of the same volunteers who helped mentor youth through the Heights Movement are now going on armed patrols. Ohio state law allows anyone legally allowed to own a gun to open carry without a permit.
“I’ve never felt safer as a Black man in my community than I have right now,” Daniels said. “These are my friends. These are my cousins, my brothers, my sisters, my aunties.”
Local business owner Eric Ruffin was accosted in his car by the neo-Nazi group as he was coming home from a work meeting.
He said he supports law enforcement, but that its handling of the Feb. 7 demonstration doesn’t give him faith that it will protect him in the future. For that reason, he says he’s proud of the neighborhood safety and watch program, even though he wishes it weren’t needed.
“What I don’t understand is how I can be standing here in America in 2025 and somebody can walk up to my window with a swastika and have guns and call me the N-word and law enforcement watch,” Ruffin said.
“We don’t want to become what we hate. You know, we don’t want to become a group of people that walk around feeling like we have a reason in America to have to protect ourselves. That’s what the Nazis want.”
The village of Lincoln Heights was formed in 1923 for Black families escaping the South, and it incorporated in 1946 as the “first African American self-governing community north of the Mason-Dixon Line,” according to the town’s website. However, residents say the community has been underserved by local municipalities, and its police department was disbanded in 2014, according to the Cincinnati Enquirer, leaving it under the jurisdiction of the Hamilton County Sheriff.
For many safety and watch volunteers, that history plays a role in their decision to add to their everyday duties as parents and workers.
“It’s just something that our grandfathers and our great-grandmothers — they started this. So we’re going to make sure that that history stays intact,” said one volunteer, who asked to remain anonymous for fear of retaliation from hate groups.
Yard signs that read “We Support Lincoln Heights Safety & Watch” are peppered throughout the town, and community members could be seen waving to safety and watch volunteers as they stood guard near the local elementary school one Tuesday morning.
Chantelle Phillips said she saw the neo-Nazi rally playing out on social media as it happened. She said she trusts the neighborhood protection group to be more proactive than officers with the Hamilton County Sheriff’s Office, whose jurisdiction includes Lincoln Heights.
“I feel like it’s more secure now,” Phillips said. “I know my son can walk home and be OK.”
Hamilton County Sheriff Charmaine McGuffey is now calling on the Ohio state Legislature to pass laws that make it illegal to wear a mask “for the purpose of intimidation” while open carrying. She said this measure would have given her officers more leeway to make arrests during the neo-Nazi rally.
In an interview with NBC News, she defended her officers’ response on Feb. 7 but said she understands why Lincoln Heights residents are concerned for their safety. Still, she worries that an armed confrontation between neighborhood residents and another hate group could lead to a dangerous situation.
“They feel they need to arm their residents, and they’re allowed to,” McGuffey said. “At some point, we are going to likely face a very dangerous situation that we are trained to handle. But the unknown is, who else is armed? How many juveniles are standing around with a gun in their hand? I cannot be more emphatic that this issue that we’re embedded in, and the way that people are reacting and acting with guns with open carry is directly related to the inaction of legislators who say they support law enforcement, who say they support families and order, and they do not.”
