Second, the Rickites -- and all the other survivors -- need to stop sitting on their hands waiting for the zombies. They need to mount a systematic offensive against them and eliminate them completely. Set a goal of 1,000 a day and slowly clean the planet of them.
Third, start making your settlement self-sufficient, so that instead of having to scrounge for leftover supplies, you can build, create, or grow your own.
Then, once you have your own needs met, start putting out feelers for other settlements who might want to trade. If they seem aggressive, infiltrate, recon them, and if they can't be trusted, make plans to wipe them out. Or at least anticipate that they are planning the same fate for you.
But I for one do not want to watch episode after episode of Morgan yammering his Taoist blather or Carol sniveling because she can no longer kill to protect the people she loves.
The Rickites keep getting surprised by these predators because they're careless. They should know every blade of grass and every breathing human being within a hundred miles of their settlement. If they're friendlies, they should be invited in and incorporated into the group. If they're hostiles, they should be destroyed when it's safest to do so.
First - people need food, shelter, medicine and lots of other stuff. So working on the defenses has to be one of many projects. Also there’s no such thing as impenetrable, just ask the French. And of course all the projects includes people leaving the compound, which means they’re vulnerable then, so even if you get “impenetrable” for the compound the group is still vulnerable.
Second - the zombies aren’t that big a threat. There’s a whole host of better uses for their time, energy and ammunition than the zombies. One of my favorite Negan moments in the comics was when he came up to Alexandria to collect his tribute and found them shooting zombies. He was incredulous that they waste ammo on the dead, he said the dead aren’t a big enough threat for that, save the ammo for the real danger, people.
Third - you can’t put self sufficiency third. Your first and second require calories to be burned. Remember that’s part of why they took the trip to Hilltop, Alexandria was starving to death.
How in the hell are they supposed to know every blade of grass within 100 miles?! Here we have proof that you’re just basically talking out of your ass. You want them to know every blade of grass in an areas that’s 31 THOUSAND square miles ( https://www.google.com/search?q=area+of+circle+with+100+mile+radius&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8 ), in a world that’s mostly traveled on foot, with no radios, no air coverage, and all with less than 50 people?! Really, think it through. Basically your entire post is a festival of “sounds bold and exciting, couldn’t possibly work in the real world”... basically you’re making election promises.
LOL!
Had you been in charge the series would have ended 5 series ago.....and we'd have nothing to talk about.........LOL!