CAN WE STOP THE 'GATHERING STORM' OF VIOLENT CRIME?

America Needs Greater Focus on Prevention, Not on Incarceration

Are the bad old days back? Read the headlines and you'd think so:
"Violent crime blazing back in America" and "Big-city murders way up
since '04." The Police Executive Research Forum sees a "gathering
storm" of violent crime, a "tipping point" in many cities.

There's something to this: The FBI's Uniform Crime Report shows
violent offenses up 1.3 percent last year, following a 2.3 percent
rise in 2005. That's the first significant jump in years, following
the astonishing crime reductions of the 1990s that leveled off in the
early 2000s. Skeptics say that this may just be a blip, that it would
take a decade of such reversals to get us back to the roaring crime
rates of the 1980s and early '90s.

But let's assume the recent rise is serious.

What's happening?

Lots of competing explanations get offered: Gang problems are growing
in smaller cities. Gun laws are loose, and the politicos fear to
stiffen them. Because we have the world's highest incarceration rate,
rising numbers of inmates are being released from prisons -- far too
of them few rehabilitated or able to land a job. The focus of America
has shifted to homeland security -- like a Cyclops who's shifted his
eye to watching airports and public buildings while giving short
shrift to demonstrably effective community-oriented policing. On top
of all that, the federal government has cut back more than $2 billion
in Justice Department law enforcement programs such as the
Clinton-era COPS program, which helped local governments deploy an
added 100,000 police officers. Local officials' priority is renewed
funding for the COPS program.

My reaction: OK, more police resources help (especially if they're
focused on community policing). But what else?

Too Many Inmates

Arguably the biggest long-term payoff would result from turning back
the clock on America's furious but failed "war on drugs," the trigger
for a high share of all American crime today.

Roughly 60 percent of convicts serve time related to drug peddling
and addiction.Everyone wants truly dangerous criminals behind bars --
indeed for as long as possible.

But our society is so prison-happy we'll add 192,000 more inmates by
2011, according to the Pew Charitable Trusts. That would trigger
roughly $12.5 billion in new prison construction and $15 billion in
added operating costs. There's surely a smarter way to use our public dollars.

A study by the Washington State Institute for Public Policy showed
that $1 spent imprisoning drug offenders produced 37 cents in crime
reduction benefits; the same $1 spent to give offenders
community-based drug treatment produced $18.52 in benefits.

How about prevention -- investing early, systematically, in kids and
families? This is the issue all the alarming crime headlines and
quick political fixes ignore.

Poverty, broken families, poor education and significant crime are
inextricably bundled.

Early childhood nutrition, care and education can pay off hugely later.

A 5 percent increase in male high school graduation rates, the
Alliance for Excellent Education reports, would produce yearly
savings of $5 billion in crime-related expenses -- plus dramatically
higher earnings and life prospects for the students. What of the
argument that we can't "afford" the depth of services that other
advanced nations provide?

A new study by the research and low-income advocacy group CFED notes
that the federal government in 2005 spent $367 billion -- a third of
a trillion dollars -- on direct outlays and tax breaks for home
ownership, savings and investment, retirement accounts and small
business development. But the benefits are wildly skewed.

The average total benefit was $57,673 for the wealthiest 1 percent of
taxpayers, a negligible $3 for the poorest fifth of the population.

Build mindset of hope Ray Boshara of the New America Foundation has a
radically better idea: Establish an "American Stakeholder Account"
for every child at birth -- initial government deposit $6,000, plus
eligibility for dollar-for-dollar matching funds for voluntary
contributions up to $500 a year. Assuming modest but steady
contributions, a young person might have $20,000 by age 18 for
college tuition, a home, starting a business or long-term savings.
What does such an idea have to do with crime?

A lot. Building a mindset of hope is the best conceivable antidote to
the lure of the streets, gangs and drug dependency. The ultimate
benefits to the U.S. economy, in added wage earners and taxpayers,
and fewer mired in lives of desperation, could be immense. America's
surest road to a safer society is what we always claimed to be the
best at -- building opportunity.