Taking Back our Neighborhoods/Carolina Crime Solutions Charlotte, NC 1994
Partners:
The Charlotte Observer
WSOC-TV (ABC)
WPEG-AM
WBTV (CBS)
Pew funds supported the hiring of a community coordinator, Charlene Price-Patterson, who was instrumental in organizing town meetings and focus groups and coordinating reader response.
Reporting started with a computer-assisted analysis of two years of crime statistics that helped the partners select which neighborhoods to focus on. They then polled 400 neighb orhood residents about what they believed to be the root causes of the crime rate. The partners also asked residents of each neighborhood to join an advisory panel that would help frame coverage and define what they saw as the causes and solutions.
Meanwhile, reporters hit the streets to do ground-level reporting on the crime situation in each neighborhood and to produce parallel reports about what worked in neighborhoods where crime was dropping. When the stories ran, the paper included boxes of very specific actions readers could take to help, including a “needs list” drawn up by residents of items and services that could be donated to make improvements in their neighborhoods. The paper also published a telephone number, manned by the United Way, where volunteers could sign up to help.
The response was large and immediate. Lawyers volunteered to use the legal process to shut down crack houses. Volunteers cleared a neglected community park, and started an after-school program and Girl Scout troops. The government also responded, razing unsafe buildings, improving sidewalks and storm drains, sending special police task forces into neighborhoods and launching recreational activities for children. In many of the neighborhoods, crime rates dropped.
Follow-up stories in subsequent years showed improvements continuing in most communities. The project won the 1996 Batten Award.
Contact:
Chuck Clark (former Government Editor, The Observer)
City Editor
Orlando Sentinel
633 N. Orange Avenue
Orlando, FL 32801
TEL: (407) 420-5468
EMAIL: cclark@orlandosentinel.com