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| More butter, less guns |
| By Ann Coppola, News Reporter |
| Published: 07/30/2007 |
Senators on Capitol Hill are pushing a new bill to increase funding for law enforcement agencies’ gang suppression tactics. In light of the gang report recently released by the Justice Policy Institute, they might want to reconsider.Gang Wars: The Failure of Enforcement Tactics and the Need for Effective Public Safety Strategies says that the current gang control methods funded by billions of government dollars do not promote public safety and are even counterproductive. Authors Judith Greene and Kevin Pranis argue that “heavy-handed suppression efforts,” like gang sweeps, mass arrests, longer prison sentences for gang members, and imprisoning whole sets of gangs have only exacerbated the problem. “I was spurred to start this research last year because some states were proposing heavy-handed, California-style gang laws,” Greene says. “I actually began the inquiry by looking at the differences between New York City and Los Angeles.” Greene and Pranis spent weeks in LA talking to gang intervention program officials, the District Attorney’s office, city council members, and gang experts. “When I looked at the numbers reported in 2005 by the LA police department I found more than 11,400 gang related crimes,” Greene explains. “The 2005 statistics from New York City reported only 520 gang related crimes. That really rocked me.” She says these discoveries framed her entire approach to the report. “Here I was in New York scratching my head wondering why officials in cities and towns who perceive an emerging gang problem would be looking to California for solutions. We were looking for research findings that could help people understand the contrast and its implications.” The “California style” of law is exactly what Greene says the new bill, called the Gang Abatement and Prevention Act of 2007, proposes. “Now we have this federal bill introduced at the last congress session by Senator Dianne Feinstein,” she adds, “which essentially federalizes gang crime and follows the California model with sentence enhancements for gang crime, gang lists, and more money for gang units and task forces.” The report, however, argues that these efforts can actually increase gang cohesion and tensions between police and the community. “I think what we’ve documented is 30 some years or more of that style of policing only results in the further institutionalization of the gang problem in LA,” Greene explains. “If those strategies worked we would expect to see less of a problem, like in New York. Mandatory sentences and compiling huge lists of supposed gang members where it’s very easy to be put on but impossible to get off, if that worked the contrast wouldn’t be there.” In addition to criticizing California’s model of gang suppression, Gang Wars debunks many of the myths prevalent in public gang discussions. “We were surprised by the numbers on race and ethnicity,” Pranis says. “The public conversation so overwhelmingly focuses on black and Latino youth. There is very little discussion about white youth. I was surprised that even though the youth survey data shows that whites are participating in gangs at a substantial rate, the issue is still invisible from the conversation.” According to the report, law enforcement agencies have said that more than 90 percent of gang members are nonwhite, but 40 percent of adolescent gang members are white. “I was also surprised at how quickly and how young youth leave gangs,” Pranis adds. One multi-state survey found half of all eighth-graders who reported gang involvement were actually former members. “You hear about the fear and impossibility of leaving a gang,” Pranis says. “We found a whole understudied group of people who are in gangs but don’t stay long and go on to lead relatively normal lives.” Gang Wars focuses on this group as key to its argument against massive police dragnets that bring large numbers of youth into jails. It also says that former gang members only rarely mention fear of arrest as their reason for leaving. “Arrest and incarceration are the last thing they’re afraid of,” Pranis says. “Other gang members are a more real threat. The kids see arrest and incarceration as part of the package of a life of danger they imagine they’re leading.” “People need to be able to distinguish between the problem of youth crime and gang violence,” Greene adds. “Looking at youth crime through the gang lens dilutes the focus and wastes resources. The way gang issues play out in the media tends to take the focus entirely away from what we know is good solid program development and what kinds of intervention are working.” The report does not promote any particular program or method for controlling gang violence. “We want people to look at the places that have managed their gang problem,” Greene says. “New York has gangs and occasional problems with gang violence, but has managed to avoid the problem of institutionalized gangs and chronic unending violence with one killing setting off whole series of killings, the kind of problems so well known in LA” Pranis and Greene say the goal should not be to eradicate gangs but to focus on public safety. “We’re hoping there will be more thoughtfulness about taking on and launching special programs for gangs,” Pranis says. “There should be careful consideration about what actually works. Basic social services like education and drug programs need to be utilized to keep gang activity to a minimum.” “When it comes to the government’s decision on where to invest, you can’t have guns and butter,” Greene adds, “and it’s butter in this case that’s offering the best hope for public safety and the best future for kids.” Related Resources: Read Gang Wars LA street gangs info center |
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