Community gardening reduces violent crimes, study says
If you engage residents and improve their neighborhoods, they’ll get to know each other, they’ll build social resources.
By Vladislava Sukhanovskaya
Capital News Service
Jan. 5, 2023
Excerpt:
The study focused on Youngstown, which had 4,000 vacant properties that needed to be demolished in 2016, according to the Youngstown Neighborhood Development Corp.
Under the FBI’s definition, violent crime includes homicide, robbery, arson and rape, according to lead author Catherine Gong, a data analyst for the research project and a U-M graduate in statistics.
The study found the reduction in violent crime was greatest when local residents rather than professionals mow the lots.
But even professional mowing helped: “Street segments in areas receiving community-engaged maintenance or professional mowing experienced greater declines in violent crime density than street segments in areas receiving no treatment,” it said.
“The community engagement [model] saw a reduction of over two crimes per square mile, while the professional [mowing model] had a reduction of slightly under one crime per square mile,” said Laney Rupp, the center manager at the Michigan Youth Violence Prevention Center and a researcher at U-M’s School of Public Health.
If lots in the neighborhood are left without attention, research shows a seasonal spike in violent crimes, said Rupp, a coauthor of the study.
