Designing Safety

New York City’s Department of Youth and Community Development implemented three potentially effective programs to prevent violence, reduce crime, and support resident well-being. Effective evaluations rely on detailed frameworks that guide data collection, data analysis, and the interpretation of results. To design reliable evaluations of complex programs, researchers collaborate with policymakers, agency leaders, program staff, and community residents to create detailed evaluation frameworks, revising them as necessary to account for changes in policy and practice. The evaluation frameworks presented here are draft versions offered as starting points for efforts to employ evidence-based public safety strategies in New York City. Continue reading Designing Safety

Examining Housing Discrimination Across Race, Gender and Felony History

This study uses the audit method to examine the effects of race, gender, and criminal history on housing outcomes. Testers, exhibiting characteristics suggestive of race and gender and disclosing one of three offenses, placed phone calls to rental property owners across the Midwest to inquire about renting a property. We found powerful negative effects for those with a criminal record seeking apartments, regardless of whether the offense was sexual or drug-related. Continue reading Examining Housing Discrimination Across Race, Gender and Felony History

Legitimacy in Decision Making: Increasing Voter Approval of Municipal Bonds

Legitimacy plays an important role in building trust in government, and legitimacy and trust have been shown to move individual citizens along a continuum of cooperation where mere compliance turns to satisfaction, support, cooperation, and, ultimately, proactive engagement. Continue reading Legitimacy in Decision Making: Increasing Voter Approval of Municipal Bonds

Street by Street: Cross-Site Evaluation of the OJJDP Community-Based Violence Prevention Demonstration Program

While one of the strengths of OJJDP’s CBVP model was its emphasis on adaptation to local context and needs, the variation across program sites posed serious challenges for the evaluation and made it impossible to assess and compare outcomes in each city. Continue reading Street by Street: Cross-Site Evaluation of the OJJDP Community-Based Violence Prevention Demonstration Program