By Andrew Adrian-Karlin
Contributing Writer
Cleveland has a crime problem. We have triple the national average of violent crime per hundred thousand people and double the national average of property crime per hundred thousand. We need to do something about it. If we want Cleveland to be a livable city people cannot be afraid to leave their house at night and walk down the street, to go to a park in the evening or park their car overnight.
There are a hundred different things that contribute to this problem and solutions to each that will help. Rehabilitation along with imprisonment, an improved economy and more jobs available, better schools and a better funded and more effective police force to name a few. The problem is that most, if not all of these take time to implement. There is something that we as a public can help solve this that costs us nothing and can be done immediately, community policing.
When most people hear about community policing they think of the neighborhood watch and nosy neighbors with nothing better to do with their time. Community policing is just making sure that there are open lines of communication between the police and the community. It is as simple as knowing a couple of officers that patrol your area so that you feel comfortable talking to them if you ever need to. It is about understanding what officers do on a day-to-day basis and learning from them what we can do to take back our streets from those who would commit crimes. It is about changing the oppositional attitude between ordinary citizens and the police that so often colors our interactions.
When I looked into what can be done to bridge the gap between the community and the police I expected to find that the department was lacking in options for the community, but they aren’t. Everything from inspecting your home for security and neighborhood watch programs to auxiliary policing and a citizen’s academy, they have a large number of programs to reach out to the community. While it would be nice if they had more foot patrols so citizens could see them and interact with them on a regular basis, that is something limited by funding and the number of available officers.
Everything I see says that the Cleveland Police Department has done what it can to provide the community with resources to help fight crime around us. However, if you are anything like me, you haven’t ever really thought about getting your building a security inspection, or taking the citizen’s academy, or just sitting outside in the evening instead of inside to make sure that someone is watching the street. So, if community policing can help our communities and the police are prepared for us to stand up and help them, then let’s do it. Here is what I am asking all of my readers today. Do one thing this week to promote community safety, take a class, sit outside in the evening, organize or participate in a neighborhood watch, or maybe just call the police when you see something suspicious. If it works out, maybe do something else towards this next week and while you are at it, post what you did below.
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Just to kind of restate a point that is being made in this post and the previous “Drop Out Rate” post:
ReplyDeleteWe aren’t battling an inadequate police force or education system as much as we are fighting to re-establish community responsibility. The citizens of a city or neighborhood are just as responsible for the policing of the streets and the education of our children as anyone else… if not more. We need to take back our communities as citizens, and not rely on local government to instill some panacea. The local governments cannot help those who have no desire to help themselves.
Great point. I think you are right on about about our continued dependency on government to solve all our problems. Thanks so much for the comment.
ReplyDeleteSilvestro13 and Justin, I think you're both right about the problem being a lack of community responsibility, I just think that community responsibility can and should manifest itself in the actions of the local government. To say they should somehow be different or distinct, I think, is at the root of the problems with the "solutions" that both non-profits and policy makers come up with to solve pressing issues in our communities.
ReplyDeleteJustin, to speak (type:) to your post, I don't think it's as simple as you're making it seem. The concept you describe is very similar to the "broken windows theory" whereby small disorderly things like unkempt streets, a broken window/graffiti, drunks being on the corner, loud groups of teenagers at night, etc lead to more serious and violent crimes like robbery. Therefore, if actions are taken to cut down on the "broken windows" i.e., some of the things you suggest in your post, there will be an overall drop in crime. I think it's still being debated whether or not this is actually true.
Yes: http://www.boston.com/news/local/massachusetts/articles/2009/02/08/breakthrough_on_broken_windows/?page=1
No: http://www.boston.com/news/globe/ideas/articles/2006/02/19/the_cracks_in_broken_windows/
I buy that social cohesion can reduce a measure of petty crime, but I think the concept of community policing is one that I struggle with because the I think the idea is too often applied/discussed as you have done here. I think it's great that the police department has programs that citizens can tap. The fact that citizens don't, however, is not a measure of laziness or lack of information (though it may be it partly). I think it's a measure of the level of distrust still between police departments and certain communities. So, obviously we can charge communities with getting over their distrust, using the police services, and generally acting more cohesively, but I think the bigger issue is that law enforcement needs to completely change its pedagogy when it comes to working and interacting with communities. To implement such programs as you mentioned, but there still be widespread problems of mass incarceration, heavy penalties for non-violent misdemeanors, and general harassment of young people of color in urban centers suggests a piecemeal application of the "broken windows theory" and is ultimately most likely the reason people don't use those programs.
I'd be interested to see if you've read about/heard of the broken windows theory and your thoughts on it.
NVISMILES: Not to steal a comment aimed at Justin, but I have heard about the broken windows theory. My understanding is that a strong and universal application of it is part of what helped turn around NYC's crime problem under Giuliani's term. (Though hiring 7000 police officers helped him implement it.)
ReplyDeleteI am not opposed to the use of the broken window's theory as a basis for community policing, but I feel it has to come from the citizens to the police. You mention a piecemeal application of it as increasing distrust between communities and the police. I don't think that it is intentional on the police's part, more of subconcious hunches that they work off of. (You just don't look right driving around here, so I'll pull you over and search the car for going 2 mph over the limit.)
The problem as I see it is that this is circular. A community has problems with the police, they don't help the police, the police don't have help tracking down leads so they resort to more oppositional strategies, this increases distrust, wash, rinse, repeat. Yes, we need to reform our justice system for both rehabilitation and to stop jailing non-violent misdemeanors. Yes, we need to stop the racial profiling that so many police fall back on. (As well as socio-economic profiling, which is often at the heart of it.) It would also be good if we could get more cops on the streets, and better education, but these take resources and time that we don't have now, today. I want them for the future, but I also want some solutions now and I think that having communities reach out where police are extending a hand can help.
My solution, while we look to reforming the long term issues, is to have everyone try to bridge the gap of distrust so that one side understands where the other is coming from. Just like most things, all it takes is one person to break the cycle and tell everyone else that it is working and helping. I'm pointing at the community because the police seem to be showing a good faith effort.
You seem to have a number of ideas, so I was wondering if you could expand on some of your ideas for changing the pedagogy of urban police work.
-Andrew
Haha, thanks for the response Andrew - the comment was actually intended for you as the author of the piece.
ReplyDeleteI think my comment was mostly in response to the onus you seem to be putting on community members to take advantage of the services police provide, and calling that community policing. All of that without recognizing that other policing strategies (usually based on the broken windows strategy i.e., mayor Giuliani in nyc) impede the development of the trust required for community policing and contradict the message that the police are ready and willing to partner with communities to fight crime. Sure, communities should take better advantage of police services because it could be helpful for their lives, but I will still submit that that is difficult to do when those services are the police's only efforts towards "community policing." I just think community policing is more of a coordinated effort than you are making it seem.
I think we agree that community policing is a lofty, long term goal, but I don’t think what you describe as the short term option can be described as community policing at all. Maybe it's a good faith effort, but until the police work to combat actions of police officers that directly contradicts the idea of community policing, I think you’d be hard pressed to find communities that look to their officers for support. Further, I think the reason why even that small amount of cooperation you are looking for doesn’t exist is because of other policing strategies (zero tolerance, broken windows based strategies) and the problems that come with them (racial profiling, harassment, etc). The non-intentional, subconscious hunches you mentioned are precisely part of the problem.
I agree that opening the lines of communication is at the heart of community policing, but in my opinion, the thoughts you then express to do so (calling the police if you see something suspicious, police on foot patrol, even a citizen’s academy, etc) don’t and won’t accomplish that goal.
To your first point, while the turnaround in crime might have been due to the broken windows/zero tolerance policy that was used (I think there is evidence that it was more so things like decrease in crack usage, a general decline in crime nationwide, and the funding to hire those 7000 extra police officers – that’s from memory and a quick Wikipedia check so I may be a little off), that was not community policing and it did not foster an environment where community policing could start and thrive. It actually bred more distrust between the police and communities of color as the decrease in crime rate was accompanied by an increase in civil liberties violations. Even so, it is frequently used as the bases of police programs in cities.
However, you actually didn't say that your idea of community policing is based in the broken windows theory in your first post, so I apologize for just taking that idea and running with it. I also am not familiar with Cleveland or its policing policies at all, so maybe they don’t use the broken windows theory as a policing strategy or don’t have any of the problems that come with it. If that’s the case, then perhaps it really is on the community members to meet them halfway and I’m just way off in my criticism of your argument .
I do think that rather than focusing on what communities can do to take advantage of police services being provided, I think we should focus on ways to bring all concerned parties to the table (law enforcement, local government, community organizations, etc) and work out a way to bridge the gap in services for communities and promotes social cohesion, solutions similar to the 10 Point Coalition in Boston or the Chicago Alternative Policing Strategy (which I don’t know as much about).