D.C. Police Chief Cathy Lanier plans to further strengthen ties to neighborhoods through community policing while targeting car thefts and armed robberies in 2008, she said in a New Year’s Day interview with The Examiner.

Her look at the yearahead came against the backdrop of a slight rise in homicides in 2007 after the 21-year-low that was reached in 2006. And her forecast factored in new development and construction in the city that is creating a new crime landscape, with property crimes on an upswing.