Crime Prevention Plan for Cincinnati's Over-the-Rhine Neighborhood

Introduction

The city of Cincinnati, OH, is seeing an increase of violent crime and gun shootings in the Over-the-Rhine (OTR) community. Since 2000, OTR has been a major source of frustration for the city: it is on the northern side of the city's business district where residences and small business owners dwell together in the city's oldest neighborhood. For decades, OTR housed the city's poorest residents, but since 2000 the city has poured billions into fixing up the community, painting buildings, and offering incentives to business owners. The goal has been to create new parks and new businesses, revitalize residences, and tap into the community's historical strengths as a midway point between the urban business district on the river and the uptown college area.

However, last year saw the city set a record number of homicides at 94, representing a 30% increase from 2019, with many of those homicides occurring in OTR (Baker, 2021). Following the infusion of billions of dollars, OTR was initially envisioned as a place where residents of suburban neighborhoods could come, shop, dine, and be entertained. However, as many residents were displaced by the revitalization campaign, and an already existing homeless problem was never addressed, the crime problems in OTR never really went away — they were only exacerbated by the city's attempt to sweep them aside. Gang growth, drug dealing, and prostitution have not diminished, and gun violence has risen dramatically, with officers removing 750 firearms from the street after only three quarters of 2021 (Baker, 2021).

This paper serves as a crime prevention plan to address the OTR neighborhood and its role in the city's crime problem. The four-stage problem-solving process will be conducted by first identifying the research objectives and methods used; what information was collected so as to identify the nature, scope, and causes of crime and disorder in the OTR community; analysis of the root causes of crime in the community; and what the strategy for addressing this issue will be.

Research Objectives and Methods

The objective of this research is to understand the nature and extent of crime in the OTR community, what its causes are, and how this crime can be prevented. The methods used included researching theories in criminology, including Broken Windows Theory, Life Course Theory, and Social Bond Theory, as well as crime prevention models. Additionally, the concept of restorative justice is explored to understand how it might help in the OTR community.

Data on the city's crime was obtained from the City Council's Law and Public Safety meeting at which the city's police chief disclosed the crime statistics affecting the city and OTR. Data was then compared to other communities where similar problems have occurred, with a view to analyzing how those cities addressed the problem. Poverty, school attendance, gang activity, arrests, and community action plans make up the main data entries for this analysis. These data were obtained from publicly available sources.

The goal of this research is to understand why crimes in OTR are occurring and what strategy can be employed to prevent them. To this end, a literature review is conducted in the next section that explores the various theories of crime. Also conducted is a brief analysis of two other cities — Mesa, AZ, and New York City — to determine what they have done to address crime problems in the past. Following this, the data collected on the OTR community in Cincinnati is presented and analyzed, and the plan for preventing crime is provided.

Literature Review and Comparative Cities

Social bond theory holds that people need to establish social bonds with others in their community in order to feel that they are true members of that community. If they do not develop that bond, they have no reason to respect the community's laws or norms; they act out of self-interest rather than out of respect for other people, to whom they feel no sense of belonging. When people develop a social bond, they earn a sense of self-respect and respect for the community, and they feel involved in the life of the community. They are no longer isolated; rather, they are active members who try to abide by the laws and norms, take pride in how they conduct themselves, how the community sees them, and how well they advance (Johnson et al., 2015).

Life course theory holds that major life events will determine the future trajectory of the individual with respect to crime (Bartol & Bartol, 2017). A traumatic event can cause a person to fall into delinquency at an early age. Abuse, abandonment, lack of familial structure, sudden poverty, and environmental pressures can all act as a kind of trauma that derails a person into a negative state whereby it becomes more difficult to get one's life back onto a stable track. People who develop drug addictions tend to represent the best example of life course theory in practice: they do not receive the mental health help they need to break their addictions and as a result end up cycling in and out of jail, maintaining a life of criminality well into adulthood.

Broken windows theory posits that when communities allow their physical appearance to deteriorate by neglecting upkeep, it opens a window for criminal activity to enter the area. Because the community shows no care or concern for its physical structures and spaces, the theory holds that criminals see the community as indifferent to its moral code as well. Communities that do not take care of themselves signal that criminal elements are welcome. Social control theory posits that the opposite holds true: the more in control of itself a community appears, the less opportunity there is for criminal elements to enter and gain a foothold. To this same end, the more disorganized a community is, the more opportunity there is for criminals to provide an organizing principle and gain influence — and this is the central idea of social disorganization theory (Takagi et al., 2016). Formal or informal social controls can be used to prevent communities from falling into crime, according to these three theories.

Zones of transition are communities characterized by consistently high turnover of residents. Families move in and out rapidly and few put down roots. The effect is that there is never a feeling of ownership or pride among residents because they do not view themselves as anything more than passing through. They are transients, and as a result, delinquency is high. Social bond theory supports the observation that zones of transition typically see the most crime in a community (Felson, 2018).

The concept of restorative justice is best contrasted with punitive justice — that is, incarceration. Whereas punitive justice focuses on removing the offender from the community for a period of time, restorative justice focuses on giving the offender an opportunity to make restitution to the community through public acts. In restorative justice programs, the offender is integrated back into the community and the opportunity for social bonding is created (Johnson et al., 2015). Restorative justice hubs have been shown to reduce recidivism rates by 26% when compared to punitive justice (Johnson et al., 2015). They are also far more cost effective: restorative justice hubs cost taxpayers only $444 to $8,000 per person per year, whereas incarceration costs taxpayers an average of $88,000 per person per year (Johnson et al., 2015). Incarceration is thus more than ten times higher in cost than restorative justice and less effective at promoting social bonding.

Restorative justice has also been found to be more satisfying to both offenders and victims because restitution is made publicly, whereas in punitive justice the offender is isolated from the community and there is no sense that any lesson has been learned or any recompense made. Additionally, restorative justice programs can dramatically reduce crime over time: "a New Zealand study found a reduction in court trials from 13,000 trials prior to the implementation of restorative programming, to 2,587 trials — a reduction of more than 80%" (Johnson et al., 2015, p. 9).

The Urban Village Model and the Chicago Area Project are two crime prevention models that can shed light on the issue in OTR. The urban village model fosters social bonding among community members by focusing on projects and activities that people can participate in together. These tend to include activities in parks, churches, or other organizational spaces where people come together in a spirit of community. Street parties, festivals, and fairs are examples. As members of the community take part in such activities, they develop a sense of pride and ownership. Some investment is required to implement this model, as there are organizational costs. However, if the community can reduce costs in other areas — such as the incarceration system by implementing restorative justice — it can free up funds to support the urban village model of crime prevention.

The Chicago Area Project was implemented in the 1930s to address gang activity, crime, and drug abuse. It focused on grassroots self-development, in which business leaders, organizers, community leaders, and others worked together to make the community stronger for vulnerable populations. Under this model, vocational training is offered, sports are promoted to plant the seeds of teamwork and accountability, and programs for drug abuse and employment assistance are provided. It is another option that can help communities strengthen themselves by addressing the underlying roots of crime so as to prevent future outbreaks.

Mesa attempted to prevent gang activity among juveniles by conducting a community initiative that brought together community leaders, police, local organizations, schools, teachers, mentors, churches, businesses, and program directors to provide teens with alternatives to joining gangs (Spergel et al., 2005). Teens participated by playing organized sports, receiving trade training, furthering their education through mentorship, and receiving counseling. The intervention program saw gang activity reduce over a five-year period — an outcome that resulted from the use of informal controls and community organization (Spergel et al., 2005).

According to the National Bureau of Economic Research (2003), what reduced crime in New York City in the 1990s was an increase in police arrests. Felony arrest rates rose 50% in the 1990s; arrests for burglaries rose 10% and burglaries fell 3.2%. In other words, deterrence was the primary method used by the city to prevent crime. Today, New York City is adopting a different approach, attempting to address rising gun violence by offering financial incentives to people who commit gun violence (Barton, 2021). The idea is that people resort to gun violence because they lack the economic resources to support themselves in any other way. The program also incorporates aspects of life course theory by providing one-on-one mentoring as part of the Advance Peace initiative (Barton, 2021).

Conclusion

Gun crime in the OTR neighborhood of Cincinnati has increased in recent years and is now a serious problem that makes the area unsafe for residents and business owners. The gun crime stems from a rise in gang activity, poverty, lack of employment opportunities, and an existing zone of transition in the neighborhood. These underlying issues must be addressed both individually and collectively. The main pillars supporting this initiative include: enhancing the social bonds of the community through organization and investment — not just for businesses but also for low-income families and residents; providing training, counseling, tutoring, and mentorship for OTR youths so that they have alternatives to gang activity; implementing restorative justice hubs so that punitive incarceration does not further undermine the structure and stability of families, and so that restitution rather than isolation becomes the endgame of justice in OTR. This will further facilitate the development of social bonds. Community policing must be established more firmly in OTR, and arrests should be increased based on publicly stated criteria so that there is maximum transparency with respect to what law enforcement aims to do to prevent gun crime.

References

Baker, J. (2021). Cincinnati sees sharp rise in shootings as police seize 750 guns YTD. Retrieved from https://www.fox19.com/2021/06/22/watch-live-cincinnati-police-chief-updates-council-gun-violence/

Bartol, A. M., & Bartol, C. R. (2017). Criminal behavior: A psychological approach. Boston: Pearson.

Barton, C. (2021). City readies to pay incentives. Retrieved from

Johnson, T., Quintana, E., Kelly, D. A., Graves, C., Schub, O., Newman, P., & Casas, C. (2015). Restorative justice hubs concept paper. Revista de Mediación, 8(2), 2340–9754.

May, L. (2015). Poverty surrounds OTR kids. Retrieved from https://www.wcpo.com/longform/below-the-line-over-the-rhine

National Bureau of Economic Research. (2003). What reduced crime in New York City. Retrieved from https://www.nber.org/digest/jan03/what-reduced-crime-new-york-city

Open Data Network. (2021). Education. Retrieved from

Spergel, I., Wa, K., & Sosa, R. (2005). Evaluation of the Mesa Gang Intervention Program (MGIP). School of Social Service Administration, The University of Chicago.

Takagi, D., Ikeda, K., Kobayashi, T., Harihara, M., & Kawachi, I. (2016). The impact of crime on social ties and civic participation. Journal of Community and Applied Social Psychology, 26(2), 164–178.

Winter, D. (2020). Neighbors in Over-the-Rhine community. Retrieved from https://local12.com/news/local/neighbors-in-over-the-rhine-community-say-frequent-shootings-drug-dealing-taking-a-toll-cincinnati