Statistics show there aren't as many nightly shootings in Mercer County these days as in past decades.

In the mid-1970s, District Attorney James P. Epstein said his office dealt with a half-dozen homicides in one year. Along with the late 1980s and early '90s came the "almost nightly shootings" and crack-cocaine problems. Many of those crimes remain unsolved.

Extensive police patrols, task forces and strike forces were enforced, but the problems wouldn't seem to go away, the Sharon/Farrell Weed and Seed project director said. But those problems have changed, Epstein said Monday at the annual Sharon/Farrell Weed and Seed community meeting. With the installation of Weed and Seed, there have been many peaceful nights, he said.