| Local Initiatives Support Corporation Community Safety Initiative |
| Building Partnerships for Safer Communities |
|
Welcome to the Community Safety Initiative (CSI) eUpdate. We hope that this serves as one of many avenues for you to learn about each other's sites and share valuable experiences in order to deepen the impact of CSI work. The national office welcomes feedback on ways to make this correspondence more useful and we welcome site updates to include in future issues. Please send any comments and updates to Mona Mangat, mmangat@lisc.org, 212.455.9357. | ||||||||||
CSI NATIONAL UPDATES
Safe Streets, Sound Communities Publication
CSI is proud to share the most recent publication by LISC's Knowledge Sharing Initiative, titled Safe Streets, Sound Communities. This new report, written by Tony Proscio, explores LISC's role in promoting community safety through partnerships between police and community organizations throughout the country. Highlighting the work and lessons from the Community Safety Initiative as well as other LISC-supported, community-based safety efforts, the report profiles three communities - the Olneyville neighborhood in Providence, Columbia City in Seattle, and Franklin Avenue in Southeast Minneapolis.
Syndicated Column Sheds Light on Successful CSI Projects
This past month a column written by Neal Peirce, syndicated columnist for the Washington Post Writers Group, was published in the Seattle Times, Hartford Courant, and Houston Chronicle. The column highlighted LISC's Sustainable Communities agenda and Community Safety Initiative projects around the country. Titled 'A Surge of Better News on the Neighborhood Front', author Neal Peirce, states " Parts of Iraq are in flames, and global warming is threatening to engulf us. But check back in our inner-city neighborhoods, and heartening good news is emerging. One major reason: national non-profit housing financiers are not only channeling very big sums into bricks and mortar, but providing critical assistance on every front from crime prevention to "green" buildings".
CSI at the Smart Growth Conference
CSI, Program Director, Julia Ryan, moderated a session titled, Partnerships for Building Crime-Resistant Communities at the New Partners for Smart Growth Conference held in Los Angeles last month.
The session explored how law enforcement and planners/developers can integrate their strategies to transform troubled neighborhoods and prevent crime in the long run. Sharon Lubinski, Assistant Chief of the Minneapolis Police Department, and Theresa Carr, Executive Director of American Indian Neighborhood Development Corporation, discussed their successful partnership in Minneapolis. They offered examples of how they work together on infrastructure decision-making, architectural design and other economic development projects, as well as how they have overcome barriers to collaboration over the years.
For more information about this session or to request relevant materials, please visit the conference website at www.newpartners.org or contact Julia at jryan@lisc.org or 212-455-1618.
LISC CSI Policy Update
Congressional leaders are supporting the continuation of federal budget spending at 2006 levels throughout the current fiscal year. Combined with calls for Congressional earmark reform, this means that CSI's prospects for securing a renewed Fiscal Year 2007 appropriation are unclear. We are continuing to work with LISC's federal policy team and our Congressional supporters to consider our options. We are also engaging in a major private fundraising effort for Fiscal Year 2008 in hopes of replacing any Congressional funds that are lost. CSI will again be circulating a letter among police chiefs around the country regarding their support for the HUD Section 4 program. Last year, 30 chiefs wrote to Congress requesting restoration of Section 4 resources — outreach that was received very positively on the Hill. CSI is also kicking off its outreach for its Fiscal Year 2008 earmark.
We understand that this process could have a great impact on those of you who receive CSI grants and we will keep you posted on our efforts.
For more information, please contact Julia at jryan@lisc.org or 212-455-1618.
CSI SITE UPDATES
CSI Brings CPTED Training to Seattle
CSI and Impact Capital sponsored a two day course in Safe Growth and Crime Prevention Through Environmental Design (CPTED) for LISC's CDC, city/county, and police partners in Seattle. The course was taught and developed by Gregory Saville, urban planner and senior partner at Alternation LLC using the problem-based learning approach, pioneered in law enforcement with the U.S. Department of Justice. The course introduced participants to the basics of 1st Generation CPTED (minimizing the physical opportunity for crime) as well as 2nd Generation CPTED (minimizing the site specific social conditions that generate crime opportunities).
The interactive workshop had participants working on current projects and provided them the opportunity to discuss and begin to resolve real-life neighborhood problems while exposing them to hands on experience conducting CPTED site and risk assessments. All the participants will continue to work in groups during their interim field assignment. The results will be brought back to part two of the course in mid-April where the group will assess the potential impact of strategies and examine various alternative tactics. CSI will keep you posted on the projects discussed during the training.
For more information on this workshop, please contact Mona at mmangat@lisc.org or 212-455-9357.
Police Executive Joins Milwaukee LISC Local Advisory Committee
Deputy Inspector Ana Ruzinski in the Milwaukee Police Department recently joined the local board of Milwaukee LISC at the invitation of LISC Program Director Leo Reis. Having police leaders represented on the LISC board promises to enhance the decision-making of its leaders through better integration of public safety information and priorities with other LISC initiatives. The Milwaukee LISC staff developed a relationship with Deputy Inspector Ruzinski after she attended a meeting with Chief of Police Nanette Hegerty and staff from Milwaukee LISC and CSI. Police leaders sit on CDC and LISC boards in several other areas around the country.
For more information, please contact Julia at jryan@lisc.org or 212-455-1618.
CRCD Facilitates Mediation & Cultural Sensitivity Trainings to Youth
The Coalition for Responsible Community Development (CRCD) in Los Angeles has partnered with a local high school safety committee which includes a collaboration of various city agencies, law enforcement and local non profits to discuss public safety issues including illegal graffiti activity. CRCD has also partnered with the Caeser Chavez Foundation to facilitate a Civic Education program which enables students at a local high school to earn service learning credits required for graduation. This partnership has allowed CRCD to incorporate cultural sensitivity models to address challenges within the community amongst African American and Latino residents, and how that conflict prevents both groups from working with one another to improve the quality of life throughout local neighborhoods. In addition to the training, CRCD recently facilitated a "Race and Power" workshop at a youth leadership retreat which addressed race relations and power dynamics within the community.
For more information about CRCD, please contact Mark Wilson at mwilson@coalitionrcd.org.
RESOURCES FOR SAFETY
Call to Action: How Programs in Three Cities Responded to the Prisoner Reentry Crisis
Call to Action, a publication of Public/Private Ventures chronicles how individuals, community organizations, faith institutions, businesses and officials mobilized to build partnerships to address escalating numbers of ex-prisoners returning to their communities. The three cities highlighted in this report, Jacksonville, FL ; Memphis, TN ; and Washington, D.C., were pioneers in responding to the nation's prisoner reentry crisis. Call to Action can be downloaded for free at the Public/Private Ventures Website.
Environmental Systems Research Institute
LISC's Commercial Market Advisory Services, formerly Center for Commercial Revitalization, has made their Environmental Systems Research Institute (ESRI) service available to local LISC offices and their partners. ESRI provides a wide variety of presentation-quality reports and maps on demand via Business Analyst Online/Neighborhood Market Snapshot. These reports and maps of demographic data, consumer expenditures, business information, and market potential for commercial districts are available to interested LISC local offices.
To learn more about what type of reports can be generated and how the reports can be used, please contact Mona Mangat at mmangat@lisc.org or 212.455.9357.
Crime Analysis for Problem Solvers in 60 Small Steps
The Crime Analysis for Problem Solvers in 60 Small Steps manual is available online through the Center for Problem-Oriented Policing (POP Center). The manual carefully guides the reader through the process of problem solving crime analysis in 60 small steps. The ability to electronically capture, store, and retrieve massive amounts of data that police routinely collect is infinitely greater than it was just a decade ago. The capacity to map crime geographically is stunning, and is now a major, indispensable tool in crime analysis. Standard approaches have been developed for the collection, analysis, and dissemination of intelligence across jurisdictional lines. In this manual, Ronald Clarke and John Eck set out an ambitious and potentially productive agenda for the analyst. They outline a role in which the crime analyst invests heavily in seeking new responses to the problems that are diagnosed and participates directly in efforts to test and implement them.
Further information about the Center for Problem Oriented Policing and a link to the full publication is available on the POP Center Website.
Making Communities Safer: Youth Violence and Gang Interventions that Work
In testimony to Congress, an authority on gang violence called for a new approach and national commitment to confronting the problem. "A community can be destroyed by gang violence," said David Kennedy, director of the Center for Crime Prevention and Control at John Jay College in New York. "Getting it right means a new way of thinking and acting."
Kennedy gave testimony before the House Judiciary Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism and Homeland Security. Among other things, he called for direct engagement with gangs by local partnerships of law enforcement, social service providers, and communities.
David M. Kennedy's prepared testimony before the House Judiciary Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism, and Homeland Security is available on the John Jay College of Criminal Justice web site.
IN THE NEWS
Each month, CSI selects a variety of media articles to share in this newsletter in an effort to encourage knowledge-sharing and dialogue about public safety strategies and issues. If you would like to comment or discuss any of the enclosed with your fellow CSI coordinators, please email the listserv at csi@networks.liscnet.org.
Federal What Works Against Crime Clearinghouse Urged
The federal government plays a "crucial role" in supporting research and evaluation to learn what works in addressing crime, says Laurie Robinson, former Assistant Attorney for the Office of Justice Programs in the U.S. Justice Department. Robinson yesterday urged the House appropriations subcommittee with jurisdiction over the Justice Department to give the Bureau of Justice Statistics a broadened role and to fund "innovation that localities cannot fund on their own." Robinson, now director of a masters in criminology program at the University of Pennsylvania, spoke at an unusual Justice Department "overview" hearing convened by new committee chairman Alan Mollohan (W-WV). Noting that "we already know a great deal about what can be done to prevent and control crime," Robinson urged funding of a "What Works Clearinghouse" that summarizes the state of knowledge.
Cuts in federal anticrime spending were criticized in testimony by Joseph Carter, president of the International Association of Chiefs of Police and police chief of the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority. Carter said "unfortunate and shortsighted" budget reductions "have significantly reduced the ability of law enforcement agencies to combat both crime and terrorism." Police departments in the U.S. "have far fewer officers and resources than they did in the 1990s," Carter said. The IACP resident said it is "simply not true" that cuts in anticrime programs have been offset by increases in homeland security spending.
Read the full article on the Crime & Justice News website >>
Mayors Convene to Discuss Youth Crime
Seeking solutions to the spike in violent crime by young people, the U.S. Conference of Mayors opened a two-day summit in Miami to discuss the best ways to deal with at-risk youth, the Miami Herald reports. At the top of their list: restoring federal funding that paid for scores of community police officers who helped cut crime to historic low levels. They also want federal funding to boost education and social-services to help families of troubled youth.
Miami Mayor Manny Diaz, vice president of the organization, pointed to the increase in low-cost assault weapons that have flooded the city. ''These kids are walking around with weapons that are used in war,'' he said. He cited the increase in the use of assault weapons in Miami. In 2005, there were three killings involving AK-47 assault-type weapons. Last year, that figure jumped to 14. The conference also brings together a cross-section of federal and municipal law enforcement officers, and school superintendents to discuss a hodgepodge of issues that factor into the increase in crime: high-school truancy and dropout rates, jobless youth, gang violence, and lack of after-school programs.
Read the full article on the Miami Herald website >>
Big Social Change Not Necessary for Crime To Drop
The most important lesson of the U.S. crime rate decline in the last decade is that crime can rise or fall "without major changes in the social fabric," says Franklin Zimring of the University of California, Berkeley. In a new book, "The Great American Crime Decline," (Oxford University Press, 2007), Zimring cites New York City to argue that "crime propensities are not inherent characteristics of either a population or an urban setting but rather are highly variable aspects of an urban environment."
A "hopeful lesson," Zimring concludes, is that the high crime rates of the 1980s and early 1990s "are not hardwired into the ecology of modern life or the cultural values of high-risk youth." The law professor suggests that New York "is now the obvious laboratory for studying the effects of significant crime reduction on the social, economic, and political life of cities." He also recommends a closer comparison between the experiences of the United States and Canada. Unlike the U.S., Canada did not sharply increase police hiring or the numbers in prison; yet, Canda's crime decrease mirrored that of the United States. Overall, the crime drop "was a classic example of multiple causation, with none of the many contributing causes playing a dominant role," Zimring says.
Read the full article on the Oxford University Press website >>
Makeover of LA's Skid Row After a Police Crackdown
Drug addicts called it "The Show:" A circus of prostitution, crack-smoking, and schizophrenic collapse on the streets on Los Angeles 's skid row, with 4,000 homeless people. Now, the Washington Post says that things are changing. In the latest application of the "broken windows" approach Police Chief William Bratton used in New York, police are targeting petty crimes to discourage violent crime and other serious violations. "The behavior on Skid Row was 'anything goes,' " said Capt. Andrew J. Smith. "I think we need to have the same standards of behavior as they do in Brentwood or West L.A.," well-heeled parts of the city.
Since the police Safer City Initiative began in September, an extra 50 police officers have worked skid row. Trees are trimmed for better lighting. Police write tickets for jaywalking and public urination and have made more than 1,400 drug arrests. During the daytime, they enforce a law against sleeping on the sidewalk. Violent crime in the first week of March is down 36 percent from last year; property crime is down 38 percent. Half as many people sleep on the streets there as did five months ago. Social workers staff the police station, urging addicts to enroll in rehab programs instead of going to jail. The city attorney is investigating patient-dumping cases with an eye to prosecuting hospitals that leave patients on the street. The Post says that, "Whether the crackdown is a blessed relief or a harsh attempt to criminalize homelessness depends on who is talking."
Read the full article on the Washington Post website >>
Groups Assail Proposed White House Anticrime Budget Cuts
Fourteen national organizations have asked Congressional budget leaders for more federal spending to help states and localities fight crime. The groups say funding for Byrne justice assistance grants should be raised to $1.1 billion for a variety of antidrug, gun trafficking, and gang projects, among others. They say Byrne funding has "fallen dramatically" since 2002. The White House yesterday said wants to reconstitute state and local anticrime funding into three new competitive discretionary grant programs, says the National Criminal Justice Association, which represents states. One is a new $200 million Violent Crime Reduction Partnership Initiative to help communities via multi-jurisdictional partnerships. The others are a new Byrne Public Safety and Protection Program, and a Child Safety and Juvenile Justice Program. The criminal justice association notes that because both houses of Congress are now controlled by Democrats, many consider the President's budget "dead on arrival." Last week, Senate Democrats called on the administration to "make first responders and local policing a priority."
The Bush administration's 2008 budget proposal would "eliminate or severely cut funding for proven, highly successful programs," the community-oriented policing (COPS) program, complains the International Association of Chiefs of Police. IACP estimates the proposed cut at $1.7 billion, or 75 percent. The police chiefs assert that the programs the White House would like to reduce "were instrumental in achieving the dramatic reduction in national crime rates that we witnessed in last decade." The IACP vows to ask Congress for "full funding" of the anticrime programs.
A copy of the letter urging Congress to restore justice assistance funding in the FY 2008 budget for the Department of Justice, is available on the National Criminal Justice Association web site.
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