How Safe Are Our Streets?

Posted Friday, January 8, 2010

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Homicides, felonious assaults, burglaries and thefts from motor vehicles are up in Cleveland. But nationally, crime rates have been plummeting. Why is Cleveland out of sync with the national trend? We'll take a look at local and national crime stats and get some expert assessments on crime trends. How worried are you about crime? Do you feel safe? We want to hear from you, beginning at 9:00 on 90.3.

Guests

Ronnie Dunn, Ph.D., Assistant Professor, Urban Studies, Maxine Goodman Levin College of Urban Affairs, Cleveland State University
Michael Walker, Chairman, Partnership for a Safer Cleveland
David Licate, Director and Assistant Professor of Criminal Justice Technology, University of Akron

Additional Information

Murder Rates In Some Major Cities Down For 2009, Talk of the Nation, NPR
Despite Economic Woe, U.S. Was Safer In '09, By Steven Malanga
Homicides up in Cleveland in 2009; three multiple-victim killings partly to blame, by Mark Puente, The Plain Dealer
A Crime Theory Demolished, Opinion piece by Heather MacDonald, The Wall Street Journal

Please follow our community discussion rules when composing your comments.

Julie King 10:42 AM 1/8/10

I think that parents need to be more involved in their children’s lives. I am sure that many of these ‘thugs’ come from broken homes with absent parents.

Anna Greiner 10:52 AM 1/8/10

Could someone please tell me why, if concentrated numbers of criminals are part of the problem, the County’s re-entry program is placing more than a hundred ex-offenders over at the Stokes Mall, in the middle of the housing projects over on Woodland Ave? Why would you re-concentrate people in the same neighborhoods they came from?

Raja 11:33 AM 1/8/10

So far the comments by the quest have been about trends - however no one is articulating nor addressing the systematic and institutional racism in our society that we (African Americans) have been subject to. By the way - why isn’t Khalid Samad from Peace in the Hood on your panel? No one on your panel is out in the community “boots on the ground” working directly with the people in the neigbhorhoods or on the streets addressing the problems dead-on as much as he is. In fact, I have never seen any of these panelist outside or in the community what so ever. Peace in the Hood takes a holistic approach and uses cultural specific inititatives to address the issues in our community. Prevention begins in the psyche of the culture. In order to understand crimes, drugs, gangs, guns and violence on the streets, you must first understand the people and the background; ask what is causing this to happen and approach the mental part of it before just hiring more officers and arresting more people. Talk to those in the community first, before jumping at the opportunity to address something you cannot relate to.

Brant Juhasz 2:25 PM 1/8/10

Coordination with the Northeast Ohio Crime Consortium and establishing Intelligence Led Policing to effectively analyze and disseminate information is the way to go.
Communication between law enforcement entities will be key in any strategy (information hoarding only impedes the common goal).