SITE OVERVIEW ♦WORCESTER | MASSACHUSETTS
Target Area: Greater Kilby-Gardner-Hammond• Population: 182,600 (city)
Fiscal Agent: Main South Community Development Corporation
Research Partner: Clark University
Crime Concerns: Gang activity
BCJI Funding Year: 2014 Planning & Implementation
Neighborhood Profile
The Greater Kilby-Gardner-Hammond neighborhood is racially and ethnically diverse, and over 40 percent of the population is under the age of 24. The unemployment rate is much higher than that of the city, while the median income is substantially lower. Educational attainment continues to be a challenge in the area, with language barriers and low reading levels presenting challenges for the public school system. Consistent with data that show the neighborhood as having disproportionately high crime (including half of the area’s shootings in one recent year), youth in the neighborhood perceive the target area to be “gang territory.”
Planning Process
Main South Community Development Corporation led BCJI planning starting in late 2014 through early 2015, working in collaboration with the Boys and Girls Club of Worcester, Clark University, the Worcester Police Department, and the City of Worcester to identify ways to reduce gang-related criminal activity and social disorder in the target area. Using an action research model, the research partner completed a hot spot analysis and collected data on resident/youth engagement, problem properties and neighborhood crime – collaborating with residents on survey tool construction, data gathering and analysis along the way. The research partner also conducted literature reviews, key informant interviews and media analysis, and worked with the cross-sector team and resident working groups to see that findings guided project decision-making. As a signal of the emphasis that the Worcester team placed on consistent, meaningful resident engagement, more than half of the project’s Advisory Committee were residents (youth and adults), and the BCJI coordinator conducted ongoing outreach through other neighborhood organizations to ensure that people’s voices were heard even if they could not commit to regular participation in a project workgroup.
The planning process revealed 17 hot spot areas, three of which were prioritized due to their ability to have the largest impact on the target area, and their direct relationship to the BCJI team’s theory of change. That theory emphasizes reasserting residents’ physical and social control of public spaces and promoting positive youth development opportunities while addressing the needs of disconnected youth. One priority hot spot is a public park. Others are located around businesses and intersections in an important corridor where crime and disorder rise in the hours after school.
Implementation Strategies
The Worcester team’s implementation activities, launched in mid-2016, are organized around the OJJDP Comprehensive Gang Model, enhanced with targeted neighborhood physical revitalization. Impelemented at two levels – one focusing on the specific hot spots and the other on the surrounding neighborhood – the primary strategy components are:
- Community mobilization, including ongoing efforts to educate and involve residents in crime watch and other neighborhood activities;
- Social intervention, such as streeth outreach programs for youth, highly visible activities in parks and public spaces and youth-police dialogues;
- Opportunity provision, though a community service and job training/placement program for at-risk teens;
- Suppression, achieved through community policing footbeats;
- Organizational change, emphasizing coordination of city services such as inspectional services and public works;
- Physical revitalization, including investments in lighting and streetscape improvements, as well as a new athletic field for young people.
Ultimately, the Main South CDC site hopes to achieve increased resident security, transformed physical conditions, youth programming, and a strong and engaged community capable of disrupting gang recruitment and youth violence.
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