The Next L.A. / Reinventing Our Future : Community : IDEA FILE: Community-based anti-crime plan.

How It Works

Through a series of town hall meetings, citizens appoint a 20-member anti-crime commission, to devise innovative ideas for reducing violent crime in the region by 65%, by 2004. These could include:

* With matching funds from local businesses, police and sheriff’s departments offer significant pay incentives to officers to live within the areas they serve.

* Departments recruit men and women 35 to 45 from other lines of work for mid-career switches to law enforcement tours of duty. Older officers, according to some studies, are less volatile and better at “problem-oriented” policing.

* College students interested in law enforcement careers get job-application points for spending a semester teaching children in the public schools, especially in poor areas.

* Teachers identify disadvantaged 10-to-12-year-old children most at risk for involvement in criminally oriented street gangs. Community-backed network offers them a 10-year diversion into outdoor adventure activities usually available only to the middle class.

CYA and youth camps become centers of technological training. Wards receive good time and other incentives to learn skills in the budding information culture.

Benefits

Establishes community rapport, encourages empathy, gives officers better basic education.

Short-term or long-term impact

Long-term.

Supporters

Residents who are concerned about crime and believe traditional measures now being implemented are only part of the solution.

Opponents

Some political conservatives who believe crime is a matter of personal responsibility, and liberals who think crime could be reduced if government would generate more jobs.

The Costs

High. But not as high as the cost of crime.

REALITY CHECK

People grouse about crime but are reticent when it comes time to pay the. Could work if the will is there. Yes