Discussed in this Brief: A research project examined whether
physical incivilities (or disorder) and improvements in a declining first ring
suburban Salt Lake City neighborhood were associated with crimes and spillover
housing improvement or decline, and whether these relationships vary across
street blocks. In particular, the study
examines the consequences to surrounding neighbors of building a new 84-unit
single family detached subdivision. The study expands the “broken windows” thesis
of crime and disorder by testing the effects of neighborhood improvement and
social strengths on crime, fear, incumbent upgrading, and place attachment.
Key issues: The study is a unique examination
of a declining neighborhood, before and after the completion of a new
subdivision. The research tests whether the subdivision serves as a
“civility,,” a new zone of stronger territorial control, and catalyst for lower
fear, fewer crimes, improved housing conditions, and stronger place attachments
in the surrounding community. Past research focuses on incivilities on public
properties and/or very urban areas. Suburban areas near urban centers are
facing a major crisis of decline, so it is important to examine incivilities on
private properties in suburban areas. Finally, past research emphasizes
perceived incivilities, but this study includes both perceived and observed
incivilities.
Key findings: Observed incivilities were related
to subsequent police reported crime, both before and after the new housing was
constructed. Controlling for necessary
demographic variables, unexpected increases in litter and deterioration of lawn
conditions predicted subsequent unexpected increases in crime up to 4 to 5
years later. Suburban incivilities are not as criminal as urban incivilities,
but they are still important predictors of later crime. Observed incivilities
were more important predictors than perceived incivilities (although perceived
incivilities do predict fear). Thus incivilities effects are in the
environment, not just in residents’ perceptions.
The
new subdivision was a mixed benefit to the community. New residents were
attracted by housing affordability, yet they experienced generally high levels
of neighborhood confidence and place attachment. They were more likely than
newcomers to the surrounding neighborhood to be married homeowners, who might
prove stable residents for the declining neighborhoods. Surrounding residents
believed the new housing would increase housing costs, property taxes, and
traffic. Residents with perceived
proximity to the new housing were less fearful, had better observed home
conditions, and reported more home repairs. Problems with incivilities and
crime near the blighted site before the new construction waned after
construction.
Place
attachment was an important correlate of lower crime (Time 1), lower fear (Time
2), better observed housing conditions (Time 2) and greater housing
satisfaction (Time 2). It deserves additional consideration as a neighborhood
resource that might be cultivated to protect from disorder and promote a higher
quality residential experience.
Target Audience: Local law enforcement officials and
policy makers, especially in older suburban areas; national, state, local, and
non-profit housing and urban planning policy makers and practitioners;
criminology researchers.
Neighborhood Revitalization & Disorder:
An Intervention Evaluation
According to the
incivilities or “broken windows” theory of crime, physical incivilities in neighborhoods,
or symbols of disorder such as graffiti, litter, and broken windows, may pave
the way for future crime. Incivilities
are expected to alter residents’ behaviors and attitudes, causing them to
withdraw from neighborhood social life and control. As residents withdraw, good physical
structures and appearances may decline further.
Prospective criminals may read such evidence of incivility and decline
as signals indicating resident tolerance of unruly or illegal activities. Consequently, minor problems become major
problems of decline and crime over time.
Past research on
incivilities has overlooked the possibility that there can be a “civilities”
effect as well. That is, neighborhoods may be improved in ways that may affect
residents’ attitudes and fears, risk of crime, and physical conditions of
homes. The 1996 Homeownership Zone program from HUD (U.S. Department of Housing
and Urban Development) is explicitly based on the assumption that new infusions
of money and buildings into neighborhoods may help revitalize them. Resulting
new subdivisions are typically built in areas that had vacant buildings or
environmentally degraded “brownfield” areas.
Consequently, new subdivisions may replace a vacuum of control in the
neighborhood, where incivilities flourish. New subdivisions may possibly
generate spillover benefits to the surrounding neighborhood. The new housing
may remove incivilities and trouble makers, new residents who move in may be
eager to improve the neighborhood, and older surrounding residents may see the
new subdivision as such a benefit to their neighborhood that they are inspired
to maintain or improve their own properties.
However there have been
few evaluations of the effects of new subdivisions on crime-related outcomes
such as crime, fear, and housing improvement or decline. Those that have been
conducted suggest that positive spillover effects occur infrequently, or are
limited to improvements very spatially close to the housing intervention.
Research also neglects to ask surrounding residents what they believe the new
subdivision will do for their neighborhood. Given that the incivilities thesis
asserts that residents react negatively to visible signs of decline, it is
logical to posit that residents will react positively to signs of improvement.
Such reactions have long been documented in studies of how individuals perceive
territories that have been personalized by their residents.
It is also important to
ascertain who moves into new subdivisions, in order to determine whether they
will become positive social forces in the neighborhood. It is possible that the new residents move in
only because the housing is affordable; if residents do not become attached to
or confident about the neighborhood, their effects as the social instruments of
neighborhood revitalization may be limited.
An important conceptual
and policy related issue concerns the role of incivilities in fairly suburban
settings. The incivilities thesis was developed from observations of
incivilities on public properties and/or very urban areas. For example, the
original incivilities thesis speculated about the effects of an alcoholic
slumped in the gutter outside of a liquor store or a prostitute patrolling a
commercial strip. Incivilities are likely to be less criminal in suburban
areas. Furthermore, suburban sites may be more likely to support positive
social dynamics to counter or prevent incivilities. Positive processes
associated with suburban communities include territoriality and place
attachments to the home and neighborhood and feelings of social cohesion and
control over the residential area.
Despite such strengths,
suburban neighborhoods are facing unprecedented threats in the next decades,
threats which merit investigation of the incivilities thesis in suburban areas.
Suburban decline has been predicted to become a major and influential crisis in
metropolitan areas for the next 50 years[i].
The large stock of post World War II housing, built to size and style standards
no longer attractive to much of today’s home buying market, will reach a point
where major investments and revitalization will be needed to prevent the kinds
of decline problems historically associated with more urbanized parts of our
cities. If incivilities are less remarkable in declining suburban areas, are
they still predictive of crime related problems? For example, does living in a dwelling with a
bad lawn or a property with visible litter predict subsequent crime? If so, then incivilities
are indeed important symbols and environmental conditions related to crime.
Past research suggests
that the strongest and most stable research finding is that perceived
incivilities relate to perceived crime related outcomes, such as fear. [ii] Often residents’ perceptions of incivilities
have been cited as grounds for public policies that reduce the incidence of
visible environmental incivilities.
However, residents’ perceptions of incivilities may not match reality.
It is important for researchers to assess both resident perceptions of
incivilities and objective signs of incivilities present in the neighborhood in
order to understand whether the problems created by disorder are in the realm
of residents’ reactions or physical conditions. If incivilities are perceived
by some residents as a problem, policies may be targeted to those individuals.
If observed incivilities are related to crime, whether the residents notice
them or not, then incivilities removal campaigns are more justified.
Study site and procedures
The present study
examines a declining first ring suburb of Salt Lake City that was targeted for
a new subdivision as a revitalization intervention. City officials secured a
HUD demonstration grant to build an 84-unit single family detached housing
subdivision on a former brownfield site. The new
subdivision replaced an abandoned school, its crumbling parking lot, a defunct
florist/nursery, and a garbage strewn field. The HUD grant provided
environmental clean-up (from pesticide contamination by the former floral
property), floodplain mitigation, and infrastructure (new roads, sewers, etc.)
in order to attract a private developer. The resulting homes look identical to
middle class subdivisions provided by the same builder in other neighborhoods.
The study began in 1993
(Time 1) with an observation of physical incivilities on 488 residential lots
on 59 blocks surrounding the planned housing site, followed by interviews with
357 residents during 1994-95 and interviews with new residents in the newly
built housing in 1997. NIJ funded a reassessment of these blocks, including 618
resident interviews and 901 systematic observations of physical conditions, in
1998-1999 (Time 2). During the year 2000,
police crime report and city building permit data were collected as
outcome variables to predict from resident interviews and physical
observations. In addition, cross sectional analyses were completed for the 56
interviewed residents in the new subdivision. Analyses of both fear of crime
and place attachment levels of residents surrounding the new subdivision were
conducted at Time 2.
The analyses utilize
Hierarchical Linear Models (HLM)[iii]
in order to analyze appropriately the between block variability. Analyses
tested whether proximity to the new subdivision, along with perceived and
observed incivilities, residents’ social cohesion, and place attachments
predict police reports of crime and resident reports of fear. In addition,
proximity to the new subdivision and social and physical qualities of the
neighborhood predict residents’ reported housing repairs and housing satisfaction,
official building permits, and observed housing conditions. Highlights of the
research are summarized below. [iv]
Sample characteristics
At Time 1, before the
new subdivision was completed, long-term residents in the surrounding
neighborhood have significantly fewer crimes reported, better housing
conditions, and more home satisfaction than do short-term residents (see Table
1). Thus, recent in-movers to the
neighborhood were unlikely to be able to revitalize the neighborhood
themselves, without targeted revitalization resources. Observed conditions improved significantly
over time while the proportion of home owners and ethnic and religious
minorities increased. The number and
overall value of building permits at sampled addresses was smaller at Time 2,
but did not change significantly for the neighborhood as a whole.
Attitudes
toward the new subdivision
Although there were
newspaper articles advising of the new housing subdivision and it was a
frequent topic at the Community Council meetings, only 48% of surveyed
residents knew of the planned new development. When they were asked how the new
housing would affect the neighborhood,
more residents thought there would be more costs than benefits. In particular,
more than 70% believed property taxes, traffic, and housing costs would go up.
Fewer believed there would be offsetting benefits in terms of lower crime, greater
economic opportunity, or improved housing conditions or neighborhood
reputation.
Mean
expectation
New subdivision residents
The residents who moved
to the new 84-unit subdivision (New West residents in column 1, Table 1) were
more likely to be homeowners, wealthier, more Asian, less Hispanic, and more
married than the newcomers to the surrounding Old West neighborhood in the same
time frame (Column 2, Table 1). Despite greater wealth, 55% of the new
subdivision residents secured housing assistance to purchase homes, due to
rising housing prices. Also, most said
housing affordability was a reason or the major reason to move to the
subdivision. Therefore, new subdivision residents were attracted for mostly
practical reasons–they were not predisposed to come to the neighborhood due to
strong attractions to the older surrounding neighborhood.
Nevertheless, residents
generally reported higher levels of confidence in the neighborhood and place
attachment (a measure combining attachment to home, block, and neighborhood)
than residents in the surrounding neighborhood, controlling for religion,
marital status, and ethnicity/race. Therefore, the new residents did bring
resources that may lead to more stability in the area and more income
mixing.
Associations with crime, Time 1
During the baseline,
when the new housing had not been built or was under construction, 349
residents on 58 blocks had both interview and police crime report data
available after their interviews until 9 months after the interviews were
completed. Homeowners and residents of properties with fewer observed physical
incivilities were less likely to experience later police reports of crime
(although the Time 1 analysis does not control for pre-existing levels of
crime). In addition, residents living on blocks with fewer homeowners, lower
levels of place attachment to the home, and more observed incivilities
experienced more subsequent crime.
Crime and Incivilities: Before & after new
housing, Near & far from new housing
After the new subdivision was constructed, the combined
baseline and post-construction data set again showed that observed
incivilities, homeowners, age (older blocks but younger individuals), and low
levels of home attachment on the block were associated with subsequent crime.
Importantly, there was a Time by Distance interaction effect, demonstrating
that both police reported crime and observed incivilities were highest at Time
1 closest to the abandoned building site and lowest furthest away from the site
(Figures 1 & 2). By Time 2, distance from the newly built housing was less
important–nearby areas experienced less and more distant areas experienced more
crime and incivilities. An analysis that was conducted only on Time 2 data
revealed less powerful predictions of subsequent crime (attachment and incivilities
were insignificant for post-interview crime rates).
Predicting changes in crime, Time 1 to Time 2
Assessments of the
eight-item incivilities composite, and two particular incivilities--litter and
poor lawn conditions (i.e., brown, weedy, or unmown)--
predict crime in varied patterns over time. Block level regression analyses
show that 1993 incivilities predict (p = .056) unexpected increases in crime
during 1999 to 2000. This analysis controls for home ownership and unexpected
changes in home ownership; Time 1 crime; and unexpected changes in
incivilities. These results were significant enough to examine HLM models that
assessed crime rates in the months after the housing assessments were
completed.
Model A of Table 2
shows that, at Time 2, police reported
crimes are related to observed incivilities at the block level, with a trend
toward a significant association at the individual level (p = .080). In
addition, model B shows that Time 2 incivilities are more prevalent on blocks
that are experiencing unexpected increases in crime. Model C shows that blocks
with more incivilities in 1993 predict a trend (p = 078) toward greater
unexpected crime changes in 1999-2000, changes that are independent of the
initial level of crime at Time 1. All Model C tests were rerun with Time 1
crime as a control as well, and no significance level changes were observed.
Similar patterns of
effects occur for the individual incivility of a poor lawn. Here, the cross
sectional relationships between poor lawns and more crime are also significant
at the block level. Model B shows that poor lawns at Time 2 are indicative of
increasing crime levels at Time 2, significantly for the block and with a trend
(p = .083) at the individual level. Longitudinally, blocks with poor lawns in
1993 predict unexpected increases in crime in 1999-2000.
Relationships between
litter and crime were the most significant. Cross sectionally,
blocks and individual properties with more litter at Time 2 had more crime at
Time 2. Model B shows that blocks with more litter at Time 2 also showed a
tendency (p = .068) to increasing levels of crime; individual properties with
more litter at Time 2 were properties with unexpected increases in crime. Blocks with more litter in 1993 predicted
unexpected increases in crime in 1999-2000. In addition, individual properties
that saw unexpected increases in litter also showed unexpected increases in
crime.
In sum, these results
show that incivilities are not simply associated cross sectionally
with crime. Block with poor lawns or litter in 1993 experienced unexpected
increases in crime in 1999-2000. That is, even when controlling for crime at
Time 1, litter and poor lawns predicted unexpected increases in crime years
later. In addition, unexpected increases in litter in front of a property from
1993 to 1998 means additional risk of unexpected increases in crime reports for
that particular household.