You can now “like” the Wareham Police Department on Facebook, text them tips from your iPhone, and follow their "tweets" on Twitter.

Sgt. Walter Correia Jr. and Communications Officer Edward Johnson brought their MacBook laptop computer and slide show to the Selectmen’s meeting Tuesday to give the board a look at the department’s dive into “social media” and a peek at the department’s new website.

“At 56 years old ... I like to pick up the phone and make a phone call,” joked Chief Richard Stanley in introducing the duo. But, personal communications preferences aside, he said he knows the kind of technology the two are introducing to the department will help fight crime in the 21st century.

Correia said Text-A-Tip is already paying off. Since the ability to anonymously text tips to the department was introduced last winter, he said the department has received tips about drug dealing, domestic violence, parking violations, and “suspicious activity.”

Correia described it as a “very powerful tool” that hasn’t yet demonstrated its full potential – in part because it “hasn’t really been introduced into the schools.”

For those who would prefer that the police send them tips, there is Nixle – which allows residents to sign up to receive text messages about road closures, missing persons, or other emergencies.

Want to get such messages AND be able to tell police about traffic problems or other issues? There’s something called MyPD. Developed by an officer in Peabody, it is now used by many police departments. The only downside: It only works on Android and iPhones.

Correia spent little time explaining Facebook and Twitter, assuming (perhaps inaccurately) that his audience was familiar with the country’s two largest social networking sites. But he did show Selectmen the department’s Facebook page and some recent tweets. (For those who don’t use social media: A “tweet” is the term for a short message posted on Twitter.)

Interested residents can check out Wareham Police’s use of the sites by logging in to Facebook and searching for Wareham Police Department or going to www.twitter.com/warehampolice.

“To my surprise,” Correia said, “I found out that there were many more police agencies in the Commonwealth who were already active on Facebook.”

And then there are the maps. Crimereports.com allows police to run their crime records through a system to create maps showing the locations of recent crimes. Not yet live to the public in Wareham, Correia promised that it would be soon.

Also not live as of Tuesday’s meeting, but scheduled to be open to the public within days, is the Wareham Police’s new website. It will have the same web address as the old site (www.warehampolice.com) – just a whole new look ... and lots of links to Twitter and Facebook and Nixle and more.