CHARLOTTE, N.C. -- All over Mecklenburg County these days, children and adults are enjoying the spring in the county’s 210 parks.

Erma Morings brings her grandchildren to Mallard Creek Community Park in north Charlotte just about every weekend. She said she watches both girls closely.

“I make sure that my eyes are always on my two granddaughters for safety,” she said.

Eyewitness News looked through a year of police records from public parks, and Mallard Creek Community Park on Johnston-Oehler Road had 64 reports of crime – more than any other.

More than half of those, 35, involved people stealing from cars.

Reedy Creek District Park on Rocky River had 61 reported crimes and most of those also involved in car break-ins. But Reedy Creek saw more violent crime than any other park, two reports of assault with one involving a gun.

Renaissance Community Park on West Tyvola Road and William Davie Park on Pineville-Matthews Road each saw nearly 40 reported crimes last year, and again most were car break-ins.

Greg Jackson, the director of Mecklenburg County park operations, took a look at the numbers and said the No. 1 concern is the car break-ins.

“It’s a problem – yeah,” he said.

Jackson said most of the crimes happen in the middle of the day and in some cases near upscale neighborhoods.

“Criminals are opportunistic. They want to look for where they can get the quickest return on their dime," he said.

“How concerned are you about this kind of stuff?” Eyewitness News asked.

“We've been tracking it for a few months and we realized we had to make some changes to address that issue,” Jackson said.

Those changes included putting more cameras in the parks. The video is sent to a computer where park officials can see what's happening at a number of parks all at once.

Charlotte-Mecklenburg police officers are also spending more time in the parks. Police even installed an updateable sign at Davie Park that warns visitors about the number of recent car break-ins.

“I think it's been very effective. Prior to implementing this program -- we had many more than two break-ins in a month,” said Capt. Roderick Golding.

Morings said she’s glad to know the county and police are doing more in the parks, but that still won’t keep her from keeping a close eye on her grandchildren.

“I can't imagine something happening to them,” she said.

PDF: Crimes In Mecklenburg County Parks

PDF: 10 Most Visited Mecklenburg County Parks