Property Crime - Workshop Report - 2003
For this report, Property Crime includes: Burglary, Theft, and Vandalism.
These three types of property crime (PC) share common threads of barriers, enablers to crime, and solutions to reduce crime. It will take the efforts of the Community (residents, families, businesses, schools, police and other governmental agencies, public officials, Judicial system, Neighborhood Watch groups, religious affiliates, etc.) to provide solutions and make a difference.
The common barriers to preventing or reducing PC and enablers that allow PC are:
- drug use, especially "Ice" and drug houses,
- lack of education and therefore, poor employment opportunities,
- lack of adequate youth activities,
- community apathy and tolerance,
- fear of retaliation, and
- insufficient government services (manpower, treatment facilities, juvenile detention facilities.
The common solutions to reducing crime are:
- Community involvement (personal, business, religious, educational, governmental, etc.)
- Create more youth activities as alternatives to boredom and criminal behavior
- Improve education on: drugs, academic mentoring and tutoring, cultural values, and family values, etc.
- Create and improve drug treatment programs for adults and especially, youth
- Continue to improve Community - Police relations, create Police stations in more communities for faster response time.
- Improve the Judicial system on drug sentencing (reduce time lag, appropriate sentences, have alternatives to jail for treatment, etc.)
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