A Thanksgiving With No Crime
by Tony Chavira
This pretty slick blog called Paleo-Future has an interesting post citing a Washington Post article (from the Chicago Tribune) from 1907 about potential crime rates in a far away year known as 2007. The article was titled "How Our Progeny Will Live One Hundred Years From Now," and the excerpt Paleo-Future used was priceless:
CRIME WILL NO LONGER EXIST
The repression of crime will largely be through preventive measures. With improved detective methods the chances of escape in any given case will be greatly diminished, the innocent will be rarely accused at all, and the punishments of the guilty will be of a reformatory character. In the meantime the study of mental science will have made great strides, and a great source of crime will be eliminated because men and women with the mental twist which leads to crime will be absolutely prevented from propagating their race.
Of course, both the idea that crime will end altogether and the idea that criminals would become some sort of super-race by 2007 are amazingly ridiculous. But c'mon... why do we still have crime? Why haven't efficiency and prevention (two staples of human innovation) been able to tackle widespread crime by now? Dammit, I was promised a crime-free world by 2 years ago! Just as importantly, why do we still have the same types of crimes after 100 years? You'd figure that innovation bred innovative crimes, but cities are still filled with the same criminals holding the same knives asking for the same money from your wallet or purse.
For our purposes, the title of Mara D'Angelo's Smart Growth America post provides a better-worded question: Can smarter land use help stop violence in the community?
New research on violent crime helps illustrate the fact that the choices people make are influenced by the places they live, and that what we choose to do with the physical space in our communities can play a critical role in our efforts to help keep people safer and healthier.
In September, researchers documented the rise of rural suicide rates in California, and found that suicide deaths were more likely to occur in both rural and urban places with concentrations of bars and taverns, suggesting that development patterns that increase access to alcohol can increase incidents of violent behavior. The University of Pennsylvania’s Charles Branas arrived at a similar conclusion earlier this year when he looked at gun assault rates in Philadelphia. While Branas found no connection between gun violence and the prevalence of bars, he did find that the presence of venues offering take-out liquor sales was correlated with a spike in assaults. Branas speculates that because take-out liquor stores tend to separate employees from the activities of their patrons (often behind bullet-proof glass), they leave the surrounding area vulnerable to alcohol-fueled predatory crimes and violent disputes.
Branas is now studying the linkages between vacant properties and crime, and he’s found a strong link between vacant parcels of land and aggravated assaults. In fact, total assaults in a given set of blocks increased by 18.5% for every additional vacancy in a given area.
Despite the fact that many may see them as a burden on the taxpayers, programs that are working to keep people in their homes don't seem so bad when you look at research like this, since occupancy can almost make (or very literally break) the cohesion and safety of your community. I mean, you're paying your taxes for a reason, right?
What's a bit ominous though is the Urban Land Institute/PricewaterhouseCooper Emerging Trends for 2010, which basically says that occupancy is going to continue to free fall until mid-2010. Will this mean a rise in crime? I certainly hope not, but the research seems bleak. For now, I suggest that maybe the first thing we should focus on is what's within our locus of control. This being Thanksgiving week, volunteer at a homeless kitchen for a few hours. In fact, here's a nifty How-To. Every little bit helps, we just need to keep at it collectively and work to improve our neighborhoods ourselves.
"Here ya go, homeless family that used to live next door to me!"
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