Member of the reality-based community of progressive (not anonymous) Massachusetts blogs
Reader Tim L sent me this link to a Boston Globe article, “Cleaning up crime in Lowell” about the recent anti-crime experiment here. Dick wrote about that experiment as well.
The broken windows theory proposes that cleaning up a neighborhood, ie fixing its broken windows and empty lots, and police attention to minor crimes, will reduce the crime and the fear of crime in that area. A controlled study was conducted in Lowell in 2005, where 34 different areas were divided up into areas given this special attention, versus areas with standard police details and no special attention. The result showed a 20% drop in calls to the police.
Pointedly, cleaning up the physical environment led to the largest reduction in crime. Misdemeanor arrests proved less effective than cleanups. And the intensification of social services had almost no effect. Those results could differ over a longer study period. But in a time of shrinking municipal budgets, city officials ignore such findings at their own peril.
I can think of some blighted areas of the city where buildings owned by certain City Councilors could use a little of this special attention…
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February 13th, 2009 at 10:51 am
Wouldn’t hurt to name names if you are sure of your facts
February 13th, 2009 at 11:04 am
I was thinking that exact same thing the other day as I was driving up Merrimack, near the health center. ;0)
February 13th, 2009 at 11:05 am
Lot’s o’ broken windows there!
February 13th, 2009 at 1:10 pm
Inasmuch I agree with “the broken window” theory, I am skeptical about the timing and motivation in publishing last Sunday’s aticle, five months after the results of the study were made public. This morning’s Globe editorial on the same dubject has added to my skepticism.
February 15th, 2009 at 4:07 pm
That’s an important point that you block-quoted. When Rudy 9ui11iani talks about “broken windows,” he doesn’t actually mean broken windows, vandalism, or physical conditions at all. A lot of conservative pundits and politicians talk about small-bore offenses like jaywalking as the “broken windows” that need to be “fixed” in order to establish a civilized public order that people will take their cues from.
But as this study demonstrates, that’s not really what works.