By JACK HOPKINS
SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER REPORTER

Citizens Against Crime is an example of how Key Peninsula residents take care of their own.

The Pierce County Sheriff's Department resources are limited on the peninsula and residents responded to that by forming Citizens Against Crime. Volunteers pair up and take their specially marked cars out on patrol. When they find a problem, they use a cell phone to call the sheriff's department to handle the situation.

"We are non-confrontational and are supposed to be just an extra set of eyes and ears," says Irene Zimmer, one of the program's volunteers.

"We're not allowed to get out of the car. We call it in," says Zimmer, facilities coordinator for the Key Peninsula Civic Center in Vaughn.

Volunteer crime-fighters don't patrol all the remote roads; police asked them not to. "They said if we don't know what is at the end of the road, don't drive down it because it's too dangerous. . . . Sometimes there are booby-traps when they are cooking the meth," she says.

While some residents prefer to keep to themselves, there are many more who get involved and go out of their way to help their neighbors.

"There is a strong community out there," says Biskey.

The peninsula is home to the Angel Guild, which runs a thrift store in Key Center. The Guild uses its proceeds to help needy residents and support local organizations. "They give the help to those who really need it," says Zimmer.

The spirit of being willing to help permeates the community.

"You can call on a neighbor and they would be right there for you," Luciann Nadeau says. "You can count on it."

That is one of the things that drew Bob and Maggie Mumford to the peninsula. They operate the American Pretzel Co. in Key Center, a bakery featuring such things as homemade lemon bread and strawberry cheesecake bread.

"The business is more my wife than me. I'm sort of the slave," Bob Mumford said recently while manning a booth at the weekly farmers market just south of town.

The Mumfords used to have a small bakery in Gig Harbor but closed that more than a year ago.

"We had just about given up on finding a new location and reopening the bakery," Bob Mumford says. "My wife said to sell the equipment. But then we found this place. It was a natural fit.

"This is a very close community. What I like is that it is very personal here. Everybody is watching out for each other."

When they aren't doing that or tending their chores, residents flock to the Key Peninsula Civic Center for a variety of activities -- everything from dog obedience classes to roller skating to a community garage sale and an "indoor park" for children.

And, in the end, there is all that scenery and open space. Many residents were born on the peninsula and never found a reason to leave.

"I have lived here all my life," says Shirley Olson during a break from her duties as a docent at the peninsula museum in the former Vaughn High School, from which she graduated in 1946.

"My dad built and homesteaded our house at Devil's Head. There was the water and you could look over at Anderson Island and Mount Rainier. I love the smell of Puget Sound," she says.

"When we come over the Purdy sandspit," Olson says, "we just know we are home."