Community Policing in Chicago: Year Two.

Series: NIJ Research Preview
Published: October 1995
5 pages
9,054 bytes

COMMUNITY POLICING IN CHICAGO: YEAR TWO

In April 1993, following a year of planning,
Chicago's Alternative Policing Strategy (CAPS) was
field-tested in five selected districts before
being implemented on a citywide basis. The program
was designed to increase the responsiveness and
effectiveness of police problem solving by linking
these efforts directly to a broad range of city
services and involving the public in identifying
and seeking solutions to neighborhood problems.

Ongoing evaluation of the planning, implementation,
and impact of CAPS in these five prototype
districts--supported by the Illinois Criminal
Justice Information Authority, the National
Institute of Justice, the Chicago Community
Foundation, and the John D. and Catherine T.
MacArthur Foundation--indicates that police and
residents have successfully negotiated various
effective partnerships and that CAPS has reduced
levels of crime and serious neighborhood problems.

Restructuring for community policing

Implementation of the CAPS program was based on
reorganization of policing around the city's 279
police beats. To enable beat officers to work with
residents and community organizations to identify
and address neighborhood problems, some of the
burden of responding to 911 calls was shifted to
rapid response teams. Tactical units and youth
officers worked more closely in support of beat
officers and shared responsibility for working with
members of the community at beat meetings. New
police recruits were trained, and several training
sessions for officers and supervisors were
conducted. 

At the district level, advisory committees composed
of citizens and police personnel were formed to
review and discuss strategic issues with district
commanders on a monthly basis; a prioritizing
system was developed for coordinating the delivery
of municipal services to support local
problem-solving efforts; and new computer
technology was introduced to aid analysis of local
crime problems.

Evaluation of CAPS in year two

Focusing on the five prototype districts,
researchers gathered information from surveys of
neighborhood residents, interviews with officers
from all levels of the Chicago Police Department,
discussions with community leaders, observations of
meetings and training sessions, analysis of
official crime statistics and other data, and a
systematic survey of neighborhood activists.

Decrease in disorder and crime. An analysis of
reported crime figures and resident victimization
survey results found that perceived crime problems
had decreased significantly in all prototype
districts. There was evidence of decline in robbery
and auto theft in three districts. Perceived
physical decay declined significantly in three
districts. At least some of the most frequently
identified problems (i.e., gang violence, drug
dealing, building abandonment, and littered
streets/sidewalks) in each district were perceived
by residents as having declined significantly.
Citizen and police effectiveness in mobilizing city
services corresponded clearly to improvements in
the physical environment. 

Citizen assessments of police. Whether homeowners
or renters, most respondents registered positive
attitudes toward the police. African-American and
white residents perceived a significant increase in
police responsiveness to public concerns, but the
views of Hispanic residents did not change.
Although program recognition was somewhat higher in
the prototype districts than in non-CAPS comparison
areas, on a citywide basis, program visibility
decreased after 1 year--more among
African-Americans than among whites. 

Police opinions. In the spring of 1994, researchers
compared views of the program held by "veteran"
CAPS police with those who had served in non-CAPS
districts during the previous year. Prototype
supervisors were much more optimistic than their
counterparts about the impact of CAPS on:

o Addressing traditional policing concerns (e.g.,
increased arrests, police responsiveness, balanced
officer deployment). 

o Reducing opportunities for corruption. 

o Resolving neighborhood problems. 

However, the CAPS supervisors were no more
optimistic than their counterparts about the
program's impact on police-community relations,
relations with minorities, the effective use of
crime information, or police autonomy. They were as
likely as non-CAPS supervisors to fear being
burdened with too many problems and unreasonable
demands and as wary about the blurring of
boundaries between police and citizen authority. In
addition, they were equally skeptical of the impact
of CAPS on the rate of citizen complaints about
police.

District advisory committees. The researchers found
that advisory committees with strong leadership,
realistic short-term goals, and specific views
about issues facing the district were more
successful than committees with divided
citizen-members and unclear citizen-police roles.
Advisory committees that focused on broad issues
requiring major shifts in public policy that were
beyond their competence seemed to make less
progress, as did those that were distracted or
sidetracked by organizational issues. None of the
committees prioritized long-term goals or developed
a plan of action.

Beat meetings. Observations indicate that police
leadership of beat meetings increased over time in
four of the five districts, hindering the
development of police-citizen partnerships. In many
areas neighborhood relations officers, rather than
beat officers, took leadership roles. Differing
approaches contributed to the lack of progress at
these meetings: citizens emphasized community
organizing and action as a problem-solving
technique, while police focused on traditional
solutions that relied on police action. Four
districts experienced a few adversarial encounters
between police and citizens at beat meetings.

Partnerships in action. Case studies documented the
forging of partnership links among the police,
citizens, private organizations, and public
agencies to solve local problems. The development
and implementation of solutions were most
successful when citizens were organized, developed
strong leadership, and initiated problem
identification. Once individual citizens placed a
problem on the public agenda or involved agencies
or organizations, their role in developing
solutions declined, and the initiative for creating
and implementing strategies shifted to the police
and other city agencies. 

Involvement of community organizations. A study of
253 community organizations in the five prototype
districts revealed variation in levels of
involvement in CAPS-related activities. Formally
organized groups, and those with a citywide focus,
a client-oriented service mission, or with cultural
or religious goals, were less involved in CAPS than
those with a crime prevention or economic
development focus. Locally oriented,
membership-based volunteer groups were much more
involved. Their efforts were important in
generating turnout for beat meetings and fostering
citizen involvement in problem solving.

Court advocacy. CAPS included a court advocacy
component, but without much early guidance or
direction. Three of the prototypes were involved in
court advocacy efforts before CAPS began, and they
experienced more success in developing program
leadership, identifying relevant court cases, and
recruiting volunteers to track cases. The two
prototypes that launched new efforts experienced
difficulty in these areas and accomplished little
during the first year.

Looking toward year three

Efforts to implement CAPS citywide are in full
operation. All 25 police districts have formed
advisory committees, officers have been committed
to beat work, beat meetings are being held
throughout the city, municipal agencies are being
called on to provide expedited services citywide,
an ambitious police-citizen training program is
under way, and further technological innovations
and efforts to raise citizen awareness of CAPS are
planned.

This evaluation, led by Wesley G. Skogan, Ph.D., of
the Chicago Community Policing Evaluation
Consortium, was supported, in part, under NIJ
grants 94-IJ-CX-0046, 93-IJ-CX-K014, and 94-IJ-CX-
0011. To request copies of the interim report,
contact Sal Perri by e-mail at
73244.2726@COMPUSERV.COM, or call the Illinois
Criminal Justice Information Authority Resource
Center at 312-793-8550. 

As part of NIJ's Research in Progress Seminar
Series, Dr. Skogan discussed this study with an
audience of researchers and criminal justice
professionals and practitioners. A 60-minute VHS
videotape Community Policing in Chicago: Fact or
Fiction? is available for $19.00 ($24.00 in Canada
and other countries). Please ask for NCJ 157273.