Subsidized Housing And Crime: Theory, Mechanisms, And .
Subsidized Housing and Crime: Theory, Mechanisms, and EvidenceJanuary 2013Corresponding Author:Michael C. LensAssistant ProfessorDepartment of Urban PlanningUCLA Luskin School of Public Affairs3250 Public Affairs BuildingBox 951656Los Angeles, CA 90095mlens@ucla.edu310-825-1005
AbstractSubsidized housing controversies frequently involve the fear of crime, a connection that is notwell-understood in policy and planning. This paper thus critically reviews the literature onsubsidized housing and crime. Three key findings emerge. First, subsidized households have toofrequently lived in violent housing developments and neighborhoods. Second, the spillovereffects on crime in surrounding neighborhoods are typically very small. Finally, although theprecise mechanisms through which subsidized housing may affect crime are less clear, it is mostlikely that concentrated disadvantage plays the biggest role when effects are observed, ratherthan the physical attributes of subsidized housing.
IntroductionIn recent years, subsidized housing for low-income American households has undergonea transformation, in which cities are demolishing distressed public housing and attempting todeconcentrate subsidized households. During the mid-20th century, when the vast majority ofpublic housing units were created, these developments were frequently sited in undesirable areasthat offered few amenities and contained high proportions of low-income and minorityhouseholds. The physical design of public housing developments was also frequentlyproblematic, with entire city blocks being taken-up by large high-rises set back from the street,clashing with the surrounding urban fabric (Newman 1972).One way in which the spatial location of subsidized housing has often failed not onlythose that live in such housing, but arguably cities as a whole, is the intense clustering of crimethat was seen in many public housing projects throughout the country. There have been manychroniclers of the intense urban violence that has befallen public housing developments, rangingfrom journalists (Kotlowitz 1991) to housing researchers (Popkin et al 2002) and architects(Newman 1972). In recent years, the recent shifts in housing policy toward a more decentralizedsubsidized housing have placed new urgency on identifying whether and how crime andsubsidized housing are linked. Now, understanding the links between crime and subsidizedhousing is critical not only to perhaps lessen the burden of crime on subsidized households, butto better inform households who may neighbor subsidized housing now or in the future. Thereare a number of controversies reflecting a not-in-my-backyard sentiment in opposition to thespatial diffusion of subsidized housing. Rosin (2008) explicitly linked the controversy inMemphis to crime, and the ongoing struggle of voucher tenants in the Los Angeles suburb of
Lancaster, CA has also been characterized by accusations that subsidized households increasecrime in cities and neighborhoods (Medina 2010).The purpose of this paper is to review the literature on the linkages between subsidizedhousing (chiefly public housing and voucher programs) and crime. Two questions are ofparticular interest: how much of the violence encountered by households in subsidized housing isdependent on the physical characteristics and design of subsidized housing rather than thesocioeconomic features of subsidized communities and neighborhoods; and what is the effect ofsubsidized housing on crime in surrounding neighborhoods? While many aspects of therelationship between subsidized housing and crime are not well-understood, the literatureprovides several important insights, as this paper will show. To preview, first, we can concludethat traditional public housing – particularly large public housing developments – oftenconcentrated crime to dangerously high levels. It is not likely, however, that the presence ofthese public housing developments led to measurable crime spillovers to the surroundingneighborhood. Second, smaller-scale, scattered-site subsidized housing projects appear to havelittle or no effect on neighborhood crime. Third, the link between vouchers and crime is ratherunclear – there exist both rigorous studies that find that clusters of voucher households increaseneighborhood crime and rigorous studies that find there is no effect. Furthermore, any potentialeffects on neighborhood crime by vouchers need to be weighed against their effectiveness atreducing exposure to neighborhood crime among subsidized households. Finally, in terms ofmechanisms, a consistent theme in the literature is that social characteristics such as concentrateddisadvantage and social disorganization have more to do with elevated crime in and aroundsubsidized housing than physical characteristics of the built environment that have previously
received some attention in the planning literature. This provides additional motivation forplanners and policymakers to enact policies that reduce concentrated poverty.The paper begins with theoretical explanations from the planning and criminologytraditions on how and why crime and subsidized housing may be linked in U.S. cities. I thendiscuss the empirical evidence evaluating the strength of these links. I conclude with a summaryon the relevant mechanisms, matching the theory to the empirical conclusions, and somedirections for future research.Planning Theories on Crime and the Built EnvironmentPerhaps the most influential theories on crime and the built environment were developedseparately by Oscar Newman (defensible space) and C. Ray Jeffery (crime prevention throughenvironmental design – CPTED) in the early 1970s, each of which were influenced bypioneering work in the 1960s by urban theorists such as Jane Jacobs and Shlomo Angel.Newman’s defensible space theory (Newman 1972) drew not only on architectural designconcepts but also on empirical relationships between housing development features and crimerates. He took aim squarely at LeCorbusier-style developments that paired high-rise towers withopen spaces intended to provide recreation for children and families. So many of thesedevelopments were besieged by crime, Newman claimed, because they lacked defensible space.Defensible space is achieved both through “target hardening,” design features that repel criminalactivity such as fences, gates, and locks, and through design elements that encourage residents toassert control over their public spaces and neighborhood environments (Newman 1972, p.4).Newman offered four physical design elements to enhance security in this context: strictterritorial definition, apartment windows that allow residents to easily survey public areas,
building forms that blend into the surrounding urban fabric and lack peculiarity, and siting inareas near safe functional activities. Readers of Jane Jacobs would find familiarity with the latterthree elements, as Newman – in addition to attacking LeCorbusier’s “Radiant City” urbanrenewal projects – clearly advocated for structures that increase the number of “eyes on thestreet” and integrate a diversity of land uses within a cohesive urban area.Newman came to advocate for defensible space design elements and defended hisframework with empirical research on New York City public housing developments, and thenmeticulously documented examples of defensible space elements in public and private markethousing across the country. The New York City Housing Authority (NYCHA) police maintainedquality data on crime in public housing at that time, and Newman found strong associationsbetween building height and crime rates among buildings greater than six stories. These analysesfailed to account for myriad selection bias problems, but a comparative case study of twoNYCHA developments conducted by Newman provides illustrative examples of how defensiblespace may work in practice. Located across the street from one another, the Van Dyke andBrownsville Houses contained virtually the same numbers of residents on similarly sized plots ofland. The Brownsville Houses were six-story buildings and smaller walk-ups, and the Van Dykebuildings were virtually all 14-story elevator buildings. At Van Dyke, none of the buildingentrances were visible from the street, and each entrance served over one hundred families,which provided access to an elevator bank. Brownsville, by contrast, had smaller, more usablepublic spaces between buildings, with multiple entrances to buildings serving a smaller numberof families. Newman noted that safety outcomes were quite different between these twodevelopments, as a result. Through interviews, residents and police reported that that they weremuch less likely to encroach on public space such as hallways and stairwells at Brownsville than
at Van Dyke, suggesting that the former of these defined territory more clearly than the latter.There were fewer strangers and instances of deviant behavior in the public spaces atBrownsville, and children and families found these areas safe enough to use for play and allowedchildren to move freely from apartment to indoor and outdoor public spaces (Newman 1972,pp.39-42). Newman (p. 27) concluded the following regarding developments such as Van Dyke:“ the only defensible space is the interior of the apartment itself; everything else is a‘no-man’s land,’ neither public nor private. The lobby, stairs, elevators, and corridors areopen and accessible to everyone.these interior areas are sparsely used and impossible tosurvey; they become a nether world of fear and crime.”Newman’s work has been quite influential. In 1993, the U.S. Department of Housing andUrban Development (HUD) acted on the National Commission on Severely Distressed PublicHousing’s recommendations to demolish up to 86,000 severely distressed public housing units.Many of these units were located in the types of crime-infested towers that Newman documentedtwo decades prior. In 1995, HUD Secretary Henry Cisneros penned an essay describing the waysthat better physical design can work to reduce crime. In Defensible Space: Deterring Crime andBuilding Community, Secretary Cisneros promoted the application of Newman’s principles inrenovating public housing to enhance safety. Further, he provided a case study of a developmentthat Newman was commissioned to redesign – the Clason Point project in Bronx, NY – whichsaw substantial decreases in crime after Newman’s redesign. Secretary Cisneros notedspecifically that defensible space techniques were a part of HUD’s ongoing crime control effortsin the 1990s.Newman’s work has also been critically examined, and there have been some empiricaltests of his work. Taylor, Gottfredson, and Brower (1984) summarized his theory as emphasizing
the segmentation of public spaces into smaller, controllable areas. Based on empirical work thatoccurred in the years after Newman’s initial publications,1 they proposed a “second generation”defensible space conceptual framework, which incorporated local social ties – that can beinfluenced by defensible space and mediate the space/crime relationship or affect crime moredirectly. This alteration and update formed a bridge to more sociological-based theories ofneighborhood and urban crime, which were drawn from theories of social disorganization anddisorder. Taylor et al intentionally downplayed the importance of physical design features, asthey found in their work and others’ that these features explained 20 percent or less of thevariance in crime. Newman himself found in subsequent work that the building size mattersmostly as an indirect effect, with residents’ use of space and control of space as mediatingfactors.Jeffery’s CPTED shares similarities with defensible space, but goes further to incorporateissues of physical deterioration and disorder. Additionally, CPTED focuses not just on publichousing but on many forms of land use, including commercial and private residential property(Schneider and Kitchen 2002, p. 101). In formulating CPTED, Jeffery (a criminologist) wasdissatisfied with the classic Chicago School sociological emphases on culture and social normsat the ignorance of physical environment (Jeffery 1971; Schneider and Kitchen 2002; see Shawand McKay 1942 for the most cited example of the Chicago School). CPTED outlines four areasto address in reducing a location’s crime presence – housing design or block layout; land use andcirculation patterns; territorial features; and physical deterioration (Taylor and Harrell 1996). Thefirst three features generally correspond to defensible space theory, with some modificationsbased on empirical work – some directly testing defensible space theory. The addition of1This includes the authors’ own work, in addition to studies by Brill and Associates, and what are commonlyreferred to as the Westinghouse Studies (Goldberg and Michelson 1978; Rau 1975; and Sommer 1978).
physical disorder as a crime mechanism serves as a bridge between planning theory andcriminological theorists such as Wesley Skogan and James Q. Wilson, the latter who paired withGeorge Kelling to popularize the “broken windows” theory of policing (Wilson and Kelling1982), discussed in more detail in the following section. Ultimately, CPTED did not have thesame influence in policy and planning circles as Newman’s defensible space work. WhileNewman’s research led to a moratorium on high-rise public housing construction, CPTED wasessentially ignored by federal government (Davies 2006, p. 19).Criminological Theories on the Spatial Concentration of CrimeThe chief criminological theories regarding crime and place are social disorganizationtheory and routine activity theory. Social disorganization theory was pioneered by Shaw andMcKay (1942), and posits that the social characteristics of neighborhoods – low socioeconomicstatus and family functioning, racial composition, and residential mobility – can lead tobreakdowns in community organization and delinquency, particularly among youth. Communitybreakdown can also ignite a feedback loop, in which the breakdown of social order createsfurther residential instability and again increases social disorganization and crime. Sampson,Raudenbush, and Earls (1997) advanced this theory by concluding that neighborhoods thatexhibit collective efficacy – cohesion and trust among neighbors and a willingness to interveneon behalf of one another – can combat crime and delinquency even in neighborhoods with lowsocioeconomic status.Routine activity theory has its roots in a paper by Cohen and Felson (1979), where theyattempted to explain the continued rise of criminal activity in the face of improvingsocioeconomic trends. They described the criminal as working through routines – similar to the
rest of us – who conduct predatory criminal activity when they are motivated, there are suitabletargets, and there is a lack of “capable guardians” of those targets (or of the offender) (Cohen andFelson 1979). Routine activity theorists – and subsequent empirical studies – suggest that landuse and physical environment features can be altered to reduce the likelihood that offender andtarget routines cultivate those three necessary conditions and lead to predatory crime.A very influential practical application of both planning and criminology-based theoriesof crime and space is Wilson and Kelling’s “broken windows” model of policing and crimeprevention. There are two central facets of broken windows theory, each having to do with theestablishment and appearance of order. On the policing side, this consists of the policing ofminor crimes and a clear signal to the community that these activities are not to be tolerated. Forphysical environment, the maintenance of properties and repair of broken windows and othersigns of physical disorder may reduce the likelihood that individuals will consider this areaappropriate to engage in crime (Wilson and Kelling 1982). Wilson and Kelling further echoNewman and Jeffery in their emphasis on the importance of clearly established territory andproperty. The proliferation of abandoned vehicles and property in a neighborhood will lead tovandalism and theft, they argued, because there are few potential consequences from privateproperty owners and/or police. They further contended that, without order maintenance, moreserious crimes are likely to be much more frequent. In this, they echoed social disorganizationtheorists when they suggested that in neighborhoods where disorder is rampant, the communityeither turns a blind eye to even serious crimes such as assaults and robberies, and ceases to walkthe streets due to fear for their safety (Wilson and Kelling 1982), further reducing the ability ofthe community to defend itself from crime.
Crime Exposure of Subsidized HouseholdsFrom the policy and planning perspectives, crime affects decisions on how to subsidizetenants and where to site subsidized housing in two fundamental ways. First, there is concern forthe level of exposure to crime and violence for subsidized households. Second, there is the effectthat subsidized housing may have on crime rates in the neighborhoods that surround them.Regarding crime exposure for subsidized households, although there has long been greatheterogeneity in the prevalence of crime and violence in different types of subsidized housing,there can be no question that a number of public housing developments have been among themost dangerous places to live in the country. About Pruitt-Igoe, the St. Louis public housingproject whose demise and demolition helped to inspire his work on defensible space, OscarNewman wrote that “women had to get together in groups to take their children to school or goshopping” (Newman 1995). Crime and violence levels in Chicago public housing projects havereceived a great deal of attention over the years, eventually resulting in widespread demolition oftroubled developments.To some extent, the limited availability of neighborhood crime data limits the existingevidence on crime exposure for voucher households. However, studies on residents thatparticipated in the three major mobility programs – Gautreaux, Moving to Opportunity (MTO),and HOPE VI – provide some evidence on the neighborhood safety of public housing residents,voucher households, and displaced HOPE VI households. As the areas under study were chosenfor their high levels of distress, the reported numbers are not generalizable to all subsidizedhouseholds, but they are illuminating as a snapshot of a subset of these neighborhoods. Whatbecomes clear is that these groups were located in very high crime areas when entering theprogram and moved to lower crime (yet still relatively unsafe) areas.
The first of the housing mobility programs – the Gautreaux program – was created inChicago in 1976 as a result of a series of lawsuits against the Chicago Housing Authority (CHA)and HUD. Gautreaux offered black families in CHA housing the opportunity to move todesegregated areas around the Chicago area, including the suburbs. The program moved morethan 7,000 families between 1976 and 1998 (Keels et al 2005). Rubinowitz and Rosenbaum(2000) in their extensive research on the Gautreaux program, reported a number of statisticshighlighting the extreme violence in some of Chicago’s public housing projects. In 1980, theRobert Taylor Homes – the largest public housing development in the country at the time –comprised only one percent of Chicago’s population yet 10 percent of the city’s murders,aggravated assaults, and rapes.2Unfortunately, Gautreaux participants that moved from these dangerous complexes toother points within Chicago and the surrounding suburbs (typically using vouchers) continued toface higher crime rates than those in their surrounding areas. Suburban movers had a violentcrime rate about five times as high as the overall crime rate in the Chicago suburbs at that time,and those that moved within the city face
to address in reducing a location’s crime presence – housing design or block layout; land use and circulation patterns; territorial features; and physical deterioration (Taylor and Harrell 1996). The first three features generally correspond to defensib
AQA A LEVEL SOCIOLOGY BOOK TWO Topic 1 Functionalist, strain and subcultural theories 1 Topic 2 Interactionism and labelling theory 11 Topic 3 Class, power and crime 20 Topic 4 Realist theories of crime 31 Topic 5 Gender, crime and justice 39 Topic 6 Ethnicity, crime and justice 50 Topic 7 Crime and the media 59 Topic 8 Globalisation, green crime, human rights & state crime 70
Crime Scene is the area where the original crime occurred. The Secondary Crime Scene comprises of the subsequent crime scenes. The Size of the crime scene can further be classified as Macroscopic and Microscopic. While Microscopic focuses on specific type of physical evidence at the crime scene, Macroscopic refers to one particular crime .
Index Crime Clock t City of McAllen 2018 14 Crime Facts at a Glance t City of McAllen 2018 15 CHAPTER TWO: UCR INDEX CRIME ANALYSIS 16 Index Crime Summary: Murder and Non -Negligent Manslaughter . 2016 135,667 138,659 141,716 144,841 148,034 2012 2013 2014. Crime Trends & Analysis: Crime Volume vs Crime Rate CRIME VOLUME
5. Crime-mapping is the process of producing a geographical representation of crime levels, crime types or the locations of particular incidents. The main crime mapping service in the UK is . www.police.uk, but various local initiatives and pilots are underway. Alongside the crime mapping service there is also
§ Property crime rates have fallen to half the level of a quarter century ago. Crime in America: Two Sources of Data The Uniform Crime Reports (UCR) and National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS) both measure the level of violent crime nationally. However, each source uses a different methodology and provides a different story of crime in America.
Section 4 talks about the overall nature of crime, distinguishing "violent crime" as a group of crimes from other broad groups of crime, and discussing the contribution of violent crime to overall levels of reported crime, and the contribution of various types of violent offences to overall levels of violent crime. A number of related .
Pennsylvania Application for Subsidized Child Care If you want help in paying your child care costs, you must complete this application. This is an application for subsidized child care. This application is also available in Spanish. If you need help with reading and/or completing
November 28, 2016 Congressional Research Service 7-5700 www.crs.gov R42394 . Drug Testing and Crime-Related Restrictions in TANF, SNAP, and Housing Assistance . crime- and drug-related restrictions were established in the late 1980s through the mid-1990s, when crime rates, especially drug-related violent crime rates, were at peak levels. .
