DOING TIME ON CRIME

Backed by 1,600 hours of research, the city's crime report does a
pretty good job making sense of a pretty bad situation.

Donald Clairmont was visibly enjoying himself as hepresented his
massive report on crime, violence and public safety to city council
last Friday. The gregarious 69-year-old retired sociology professor
said he spent about 1,600 hours over the last year-and-a-half on
research and writing. "I could have been drinking beer and watching
Captain Kangaroo," he joked, "but I loved talking to people, I like
the idea of multiple realities." To come up with his 64
recommendations, Clairmont interviewed scores of experts, politicians
and activists.

He conducted community meetings, commissioned public surveys and
sifted through the results of a series of focus-group discussions. He
estimates that one out of every 60 adults in HRM contributed directly
to his report as he searched for consensus on the best ways to reduce
violent crime. That search reflects both the strengths and weaknesses
of Clairmont's report. Where he found consensus, his recommendations
make sense, but where there is disagreement on contentious issues,
Clairmont skates away from badly needed, but controversial, solutions.

His main recommendation is the key to the success or failure of his
whole approach. Clairmont says HRM should hire a full-time public
safety co-ordinator, reporting directly to the mayor's office.

At first glance, it seems like a bland bureaucratic solution to the
gritty realities of muggings, gang beatings and drive-by shootings;
cracked ribs, broken jaws and blood on the sidewalks.

But Clairmont obviously knows that without a city official solely
responsible for public safety, his other recommendations will be
implemented in a haphazard fashion or slip through the cracks
altogether. HRM needs a powerful co-ordinator with a strong staff who
can push politicians and officials at all levels of government to get
at the root causes of crime.

Clairmont identifies them in his report---poverty, shitty housing,
addictions and racism.

He suggests that the Nova Scotia government follow the lead of other
provinces by helping to pay for the new co-ordinator.

Clairmont is also adamant that HRM needs to do more about the crime
and violence associated with racism and the poverty that often goes
with it. He points out, for example, that in 2005, young African-Nova
Scotians accounted for nearly one-quarter of the youths sentenced to
custody, a figure way out of proportion to the size of the black
population. At the same time, he points out that African-Nova Scotians
themselves are frequent victims of crime, a situation he calls
"striking and unacceptable." Clairmont blasted the HRM committee on
race relations for being ineffective and urged the city to revitalize
it. "I'm not black," he said, his voice rising in indignation, "but I
know dozens and dozens and dozens of people in the black community who
have ideas and want to do things."

Unfortunately, Clairmont's search for consensus seems to have blinded
him to the fact that some of our laws are themselves major
contributors to crime and violence.

The senseless attempt to outlaw so-called illicit drugs has led, as it
did with the prohibition of alcohol, to a flourishing criminal
underworld and sporadic outbreaks of murder, mayhem and police
corruption. Clairmont should have urged HRM to lobby for the
decriminalization of drugs as the best way to eliminate the worst
effects of the organized drug trade. But instead, he recommends
special drug courts that would encourage addicts convicted of crimes
to kick their habits instead of doing jail time---a band-aid solution
if there ever was one. Similarly, he steers away from urging the
decriminalization of the sex trade so that most of it could move
indoors where prostitutes can more easily protect themselves from the
routine violence they encounter on the streets.

Instead, Clairmont lamely recommends that HRM study what other cities
have done about street prostitution.

All in all though, Clairmont's report is well worth the $25,000 plus
expenses he got paid to produce it. The good professor deserves a
grade of B+. Not in the excellent A-range mind you, but pretty good
nonetheless.

As part of an ongoing project to monitor violence in Halifax, The
Coast is keeping an up to date violence map that covers all the HRM.
You can examine it in greater detail by clicking on the link below.