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"Everybody wants to belong to a team. Some of those teams they call gangs."

That's one thing Thurmont resident Gene Doyon said he learned last week at a Meet the Chief night where Thurmont Police Department officers gave a presentation about gangs affecting the youth of Frederick County.

"Most of us don't know anything about gangs, let's face it," he added. "I didn't know it could come to a small town."

Officers at the department said Doyon's assumption that gangs steer clear of rural areas is similar to what many people think.

"Gangs are in Thurmont, not as large as like bigger cities like Frederick ... but gangs are here and we want the people in town to know how to look for gangs, what the signs are," Chief Greg Eyler said.

"I don't think enough people are educated on what to look for," Officer Mark DeBord added.

That's why the department hosted the presentation on March 9, which explained to attendees what gang members wear, how they act and why their lifestyle might appeal to adolescents.

DeBord and Officer William Murray team to battle gang activity in the area. Both officers took a special training class on gangs at the Maryland Police and Correctional Training Commission in Sykesville, DeBord said. He added the team was formed about two months ago, after an officer on patrol found some gang graffiti behind the old Jubilee grocery store building.

"Gangs are cancer and once you get them inside your city or system it's hard to get them out," DeBord said. So officers at the department "are proactively attacking this issue."

The department has known about local gang activity for about two years, since officers first starting noticing graffiti within town limits, he said. When Thurmont officers discussed the situation with Frederick city detectives, they confirmed gang activity in the town, he added.

Since then, Thurmont officers have found a gang member living in Emmitsburg and one who regularly socializes with a woman living in Thurmont, although he hasn't been seen around town for several months, DeBord said.

Doyon said the presentation helped him. He plans to keep a closer eye out for signs of trouble in his five grandchildren, and he wishes that more parents of children who are especially susceptible to peer pressure, could have seen the presentation as well.

Still, "the place was packed, I mean standing-room only, people standing outside the door," he said. Eyler said there were at least 70 people in attendance, which is more than the department's conference room can comfortably accommodate.

"We're going to have to give [the presentation] again," said Tom Iaccarino, chairman of the Thurmont Police Commission. He said it was given once before but was poorly attended.

"The presentation was excellent, it provided an up to date and current assessment of gang activity not only in Thurmont but in Frederick County," he said. "Every parent and every citizen in Thurmont should try to go," he added. "The more informed the public is, the safer a community we will be."

Elizabeth Lee, another Thurmont resident, agreed with Doyon and Iaccarino, saying that the presentation was informative but she hopes that more area residents will eventually be able to see it.

"I would love if the schools would allow the police department to bring that information to them," she said, noting that children are the ones most at risk for being recruited into gangs.

Alice Mullinix agreed.

"If they have this again, I would like to have my son and his wife take a look at what they showed us," she said, adding that parents of young children should make themselves aware of signs that indicate gang involvement.

"A kid that's ... either getting picked on in school or if he doesn't really have a great home ... it seems like he'll be looking for somebody to be his friend and that's what a gang offers," Doyon said, agreeing with Lee that giving the presentation in schools would be a good idea because it would inform teachers and kids about the real-life dangers of gang activity.

"I think it was great," Mullinix concluded. "I think they should have this at least once a month ... Maybe we could be part of keeping this out of Thurmont and keeping it out of the county. But you have to start where you live."

E-mail Courtney Pomeroy at cpomeroy@gazette.net.