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.01/16/1998 16:09
202-638-0673
FIGHT CRIME
PAGE 01
NATIONAL ADVISORY
President
COMMITTEE
FIGHT
INVEST
Sanford A. Newman
Associate Directors
POLICE
CRIME
IN KIDS
Amy R. Dawson
Brendan J. Fitzsimona
Philip Arreole
Chief, Tacoma, WA
Sherman Block
Media Director
Sheriff, LA County, CA
John W. Bartiett
William Bratton
Fmr. Commiss'r. NYC
A. Cabrel
President, Int'l Union of
Facsimile
NATIONAL CRIME AND
Police Ass'ns, AFL-CIO
VIOLENCE PREVENTION
Dean M. Esserman
RESOURCE COUNCIL
Chief, Metro North, NY
Glibert G. Gallegos
TO:
Bobbi Greene
456-6244
President, Fraternal
FROM: John W. Bartlett
Barbara T. Bowman, A.
Order of Police
E. Douglas Hamilton
DATE: January 16, 1998
President, Erickson Institute of
Advanced Study in Child
Chief, Louisville, KY
PAGES: 7
Development
Phil E. Kelth
John A. Calhoun, M.P.A.
Chief, Knoxville, TN
RE:
FIGHT CRIME's support for Clinton child care plan
Executive Director, National
R. GII Kerlikoweke
Crime Prevention Council
Commissioner, Buffalo, NY
Donald J. Cohen, M.D.
Talmadge N. Moore
Director, Yake Child Study
(
Ft. Wayne. IN
Center
Charles A. Moose
Chief, Portland, OR
Ms. Greene,
Sanford Dornbusch, Ph.D.
Patrick V. Murphy
Professor Emeritus, Stanford:
Former Commiss'r, NYC,
Advisory Board Chair, Stenford
Sandy is out of the office today, but asked me to fax you copies of
Center on Adolescence
DC, Detroit, Syracuse
Dennis E. Nowicki
some of our materials.
Craig W. Floyd
Chief, Charlotte-
Chair, National Law Enforce-
Macklenburg, NC
ment Officers Memorial Fund
Matt L. Rodriguez
As Sandy discussed with you, our first release was less
James A. Fox, Ph.D.
Superintendent, Chicago, IL
Dean. College of Criminal
Joseph Samuels
complimentary than it ought to have been. I am enclosing that
Justice. Northeastem University
Chief, Oakland, CA
Darrel W. Stephens
release, along with an editorial board memo we distributed late last
John W. Gardner, Ph.D.
Former US Secretary of Health,
Fmr. Chief, St. Petersburg, FL
week, and a subsequent press release (from Wednesday's press
Education, and Welfare:
Patrick J. Sullivan, Jr.
briefing by the Child Care Action Campaign). These documents
Consulting Professor,
a
Sheriff, Arapahoe Co., CO
Richard Gerber, M.D.
Donald H. Warshaw
reflect the development of our position of strong support for
Associate Clinical Professor of
Chief, Miami, FL
President Clinton's child care initiative.
Psychietry, GWU Med. School
Robert S. Warshaw
Alice 8. Honig, Ph.D.
Chief, Rocheater, NY
Elizabeth M. Watson
Professor Emerica, Child
Former Chief, Austin, TX
Please don't hesitate to contact me if you have any questions.
Development, Syracuse Univ.
Thomas C. Joe, M.A.
PROSECUTORS
Director, Center for the
Study of Social Policy
Ronald Earle
District Atty., Travia Co., TX
Ralph c. Martin, II
John Ballo
J. Ronald Lally, Ed.D.
Dir., Clr. for Child and Family
Norman 8. Early, Jr.
Studies, Far West Laboratory
Former D.A., Denver, CO
Steven Marans, Ph.D.
Director, Program on Child
District Atty., Suffolk Ce., MA
Development-Community
O'Malley
Policing, Yale Child Study a
Fmr. State's Atty., Cook Co., IL
Ray Mershall, Ph.D.
Elliot L. Richardson
Former US Anomey General
Enclosures
Former US Secretary of Labor;
Chair in Economics and Public
and Secretary of HEW. of
Press Release 1/7/98
Affairs, Univ. of Texas A
Defense and of Commerce
Editorial Board Memorandum 1/9/98
Jack McDevitt, Ph.D.
Grant Woods
Professor, College of Criminal
Attorney General, AZ
Press Release 1/14/98
Justice, Northeastern Univ.;
SURVIVORS
Co-Director, Center for Criminal
Justice Policy Research
Frances Davis
Lisbeth B. Schorr
Fdr., Mothers of AN Children
Lecturer in Social Medicine,
Ellen Halbert
Harvard University
Editor, National Crime
David P. Welkart, Ph.D.
Victims Report
President, High/Scope
Carole Grent Hall
Educational Research Fdn.
Director, Ginger Ridge
Bernice Weissbourd
Residents' Initiative
President, Family Resource
Marc Klass
Council
Fdr., Klass Fdn. for Children
Richard Welssbourd, Ph.D.
Dennis Lees, Ph.D.
Professor, Kennedy School of
Mgr., Mental Health Clinic
Government, Harvard
Lewis
Chuck Wexler, Ph.D.
President, Parents of
Executive Director. Police
Murdered Children
Executive Research Forum
Gorden Rondeau &
Edward Zigler, Ph.D.
Elaine Rondeau
Director, Bush Center in Child
Founders, Action America:
Development and Social Policy,
Murder Must End Now
Yale University
1334 - G Street, NW Suite B Washington, DC 20005-3107 (202) 638-0690 Fax (202) 638-0673 E-mail: [email protected]
A project of the Action Against Crime and
# Education Fund
01/16/1998
16:09
202-638-0673
FIGHT CRIME
PAGE 02
NATIONAL ADI
DRY
President
COMMITTEE
Sanford A. Newman
FIGHT
INVEST
POLICE
Associate Directors
Philip Arreols
CRIME
IN KIDS
Amy R. Dawson
Chief, Tacome, WA
Brendan J. Fitzsimons
Sherman Block
Sheriff, LA County
Communications Director
William Bretton
John W. Bartiert
Fmr. Commiss'r., NYC
Sam A. Cabral
For Immediate Release
President. Init Union of
CONTACT: John Bartlett, Sanford Newman
Police Ass'ns, AFL-CIO
Wednesday, January 7, 1998
(202) 638-0690, or (800) 245-6476 outside metro D.C.
Dean M. Esserman
Chief, Metro North, NY
Thomas C. Frazier
Police Commissioner,
Law Enforcement Leaders: Clinton Child Care Plan A
Baltimore, MD
Gilbert G. Gallegos
First Step, But Greater Investment Needed
President, Fraternal
Order of Police
Police, Prosecutors, and Crime Victims Say Congress Must Go Farther
E. Douglas Hemilton
Chief, Lauisville, KY
to Ensure 'Right Start' and After-School Programs for Kids Most At-Risk
Phil E. Keith
Chief, Knoxville, TN
R. Gil Kerlikowske
Commissioner. Buffalo, NY
President Clinton's child care plan is an important first step toward crime prevention,
Charles A. Moose
Chiel, Portland, OR
but to really seize this opportunity to make American communities safer will take more
Patrick V. Murphy
Former Commiss'r. NYC,
investments in early childhood development care for America's most at-risk infants and
DC. Detroit. Syracuse
Dennis E. Nowicki
Chief, Charlotte, NC
toddlers, and after-school programs to cut into the "prime time for juvenile crime," a
Reuban B. Ortega
Chief, Sall Lake City, UT
national organization of police chiefs, prosecutors and crime survivors said today.
L. Rodriguez
Fmr. Police Sup'l. Chicago, IL
Joseph Semuels
Clinton plan could cut crime sharply by Investing more in the kids most at-risk
Chief, Ockland, CA
Darroll Sanders
Chief, Frankfort, IL
rel W. Stephens
"The President's funding for child care is a major step forward, but still meets less than
Fmr. Chief, St. Petersburg. FL
Patrick J. Sullivan, Jr.
half the established need, and virtually ignores after-school programs. The President has
Sheriff, Arapahoe Co., CO
Donald H. Warshaw
shown that these vital investments save tax dollars. They can also dramatically reduce
Chief, Miami. FL
Robert S. Warshaw
Chief. Rocheater. NY
crime. Why not then seek the funding that would get the job done?"
Elizabeth M. Watson
Former Chief. Austin, TX
- former U.S. Attorney General Elliot L. Richardson,
PROSECUTORS
for FIGHT CRIME: INVEST IN KIDS
Ronald Earle
District Atty., Travis Co., TX
Norman S. Early, Jr.
Former D.A., Denver, CO
The crime fighters cited studies in which at-risk toddlers denied quality early
Relph C. Martin, II
District Atty., Suffolk Co., MA
childhood care were five times more likely to become chronic law-breakers as
Jack O'Malley
Fmr. State's Ally., Cook Co.,
Elliot L Richardson
"adults, and ten times more likely to be delinquent at age 16.
Former Attorney General
and Secretary of HEW. of
Defense and of Commerce
Plan ignores school-age care that could shut down 'Prime Time for Juvenlle
Jim Ryan
Allorney General, IL
Crime'
Grant Woods
Attorney General, AZ
SURVIVORS
"Violent juvenile crime triples in the hour after the school bell rings, and nearly half of
Frances Davis
Fdr Mothers of All Children
violent juvenile crime takes place in the after-school hours. This bill is an important first
Ellen Halbert
Editor, National Crime
step, but falls far short of providing after-school programs on the scale needed to
Victima Report
Carole Grant Hall
respond to the 'prime time for juvenile crime."
Director, Ginger Ridge
Residents' Initiative
Marc Kleas
- Northeastern University criminologist James Alan Fox
Far., Klass Fdn. for Children
for FIGHT CRIME: INVEST IN KIDS
Dennis Lees, Ph.D.
Mgr., Mental Health Clinic
Jean Lewie
President. Parents of
"Everyone knows that the delivery of child care must take place not in our capitals but
Murdered Children
Gordon Rondeau &
in our communities, through partnerships of schools, parents, businesses and
Elaine Rondeau
Founders, Action America:
Murder Must End Now
1334 G Street, NW
Suite
B
Washington,
DC
20005-3107
(202) 638-0690
Fax
(202)
638-0673
www.fightcrime.org
A project of the
Against Crime and Vielence Education Fund
01/16/1998 16:09
202-638-0673
FIGHT CRIME
PAGE 03
community groups. But there is no government responsibility more fundamental than protecting
public safety. The government can't meet that obligation without going farbeyond this proposal's
limited initiatives on infant and toddler care and after-school programs."
- Elmhurst (IL) Police Chief John Millner
for FIGHT CRIME: INVEST IN KIDS
"Today, the deficit which most threatens America's families is the crime prevention deficit - the
gaping shortfall in our investment in the programs proven to prevent crime by helping at-risk kids
get the right start."
- Sanford A. Newman, President, FIGHT CRIME: INVEST IN KIDS
"We guarantee criminals taxpayer-provided room and board in a jail cell. Shouldn't we be just as
ready to prevent crime by guaranteeing good child care to toddlers and quality after-school
programs for older kids?"
- Buffalo (NY) Police Commissioner Gil Kerlikowske, president,
Police Executive Research Forum, for FIGHT CRIME: INVEST IN KIDS
Crime Fighters Say Congress should earmark permanent funding for every American
community to ensure that:
all low-income children have access to a Head Start program - and Early Head Start or
other quality programs for kids under three - with the resources to offer top quality,
full-day, year-round care.
CCDBG commitments ensure that every working family has access to quality early
childhood education and care so their kids can start school ready to succeed.
all school-age youth have access to quality after-school programs that protect them from
violence and help them build skills and values like honesty, responsibility and teamwork.
FIGHT CRIME: INVEST IN KIDS leaders are available for comment by calling (202) 638-0690.
For more Information on the anti-crime impact of Investments in kids, call FIGHT CRIME:
INVEST IN KIDS or visit http://www.fightcrime.org/ on the Internet.
COPY
01/16/1998
16:09
202-638-0673
FIGHT CRIME
PAGE 04
President
Sanford A. Newman
NATIONAL ADVISORY
CO
ITEE
FIGHT
INVEST
Associate Directors
POLICE
Amy R. Dawson
Phillp Arroola
CRIME
IN KIDS
Brendan J. Fitzsimons
Chief, Tacoma, WA
Sherman Block
Communications Director
John W. Ba
$
SheriM, LA County, CA
William Bratton
Fmr. Commiss'r., NYC
Sam A. Cabral
President. Int'l Union of
Police Ass'ns. AFL-CIO
Dean M. Esserman
Chief, Metro North, NY
COPY
Facsimile
Thomas C. Frazier
Police Commissioner.
Baltimore, MD
Editorial Writers
FROM:
John W. Bartlett
Gllbert G. Gallegos
TO:
President. Fraternal
Order of Police
DATE: January 9, 1998
PAGES:
5
E. Douglas Hamilton
Chief, Louisville. KY
RE:
"A New Consensus on Child Care & After-School Programs":
Phil E. Keith
Key Facts and Background for your Editorials on
Chief Knoxville, TN
R.
Kerlikowake
President Clinton's Child Care Proposal
Commissioner, Buffalo, NY
Charles A. Moose
Chief, Portland, OR
Patrick V. Murphy
Former Commiser. NYC,
Police, Prosecutors, Crime Victims & Scholars Now Agree:
DC, Detroit, Syrecuse
Dennis E. Nowicki
Chief, Charlotte. NC
Child Care, After School Programs = Key Weapons Against Crime
Reuban B. Ortega
Chief, Salt Lake City. UT
When Government Fails to Assure Access to Quality Child Care, it Breaches
Matt L. Rodriguez
Fmr. Police Sup't, Chicago, IL
Its Most Fundamental Responsibility - Protecting Public Safety
Joseph Samuels
Chief, Oakland. CA
Darrell Sanders
One of the most striking new developments of the past year has been the virtual
Chief, Frankfort, IL
unanimity among police, prosecutors, crime victims and criminologists - crossing all
Darrel W. Stephens
Fmr. Chief, St. Peteraburg, FL
ideological lines — that investments in quality early childhood development and after-
Patrick J. Sullivan, Jr.
Sheriff, Arapahoe Co., CO
school programs are among our most powerful weapons against crime. For example:
Donald H. Warshaw
Chief, Miami, FL
Robert 6. Warshaw
Nine out of ten police chiefs (92%) nation-wide, in a Northeastern University poll,
Chief. Rochester. NY
agreed "America could sharply reduce crime if government invested more in
Elizabeth M. Watson
Former Chief, Austin, TX
programs to help children and youth get a good start" by "fully funding Head
PROSECUTORS
Start for infants and toddlers and providing after-school programs and
Ronald Earle
mentoring" for older kids.
District Ally., Travis Co., TX
Norman S. Early, Jr.
Former D.A., Denver, CO
The police chiefs pick "increasing investment in programs that help all children and
Ralph c. Martin, II
youth get a good start" as the "most effective" anti-crime strategy nearly 4-to-1 over
District Alty., Suffolk Co., MA
Jack O'Malley
"trying more juveniles as adults" or even "hiring additional police officers."
Fmr. State's Ally., Cook Co., IL
Elliot L. Richardson
Former Attorney General
Studies show dramatic Impact of Early Childhood Care on Crime. For example,
and Secretary of HEW, of
two studies compared kids randomly assigned to receive quality early childhood
Defense and of Commerce
Jim Ryan
care or to do without it. Results: Denying these services multiplied by ten times the
Attorney General. IL
Grant Woods
risk of later delinquency and by five times the risk the kids would become chronic
Allorney General. AZ
lawbreakers as adults.
CRIME SURVIVORS
Frances Davis
After-school hours are "prime time for juvenile crime." FBI data show that violent
Fdr., Mothers of All Children
juvenile crime triples in the hour after school lets out; the peak hours are from 3:00 p.m.
Ellen Halbert
Editor, National Crime
- 6:00 p.m. These are also the peak hours for teen experimentation with sex and drugs.
Victims Report
Carole Grant Hall
Director, Ginger Ridge
What does this mean for Americans, and for President Clinton's child care
Residents' Initiative
Initiative? Police, prosecutors, and crime victims are a pretty conservative bunch.
Marc Klass
Fdr., Klass Fdn. for Children
Here's what they say:
Dennis Less, Ph.D.
Mgr., Menial Health Clinic
Jean Lewis
"We guarantee criminals taxpayer-provided room and board in a jail cell. Shouldn't
President, Parents of
Murdered Children
we be just as ready to prevent crime by guaranteeing good child care to toddlers and
Gordon Rondeau &
quality after-school programs for older kids?"
Elaine Rondeau
Founders, Action America:
- Buffalo (NY) Police Commissioner Gil Kerlikowske, president,
Murder Must End Now
Police Executive Research Forum, for FIGHT CRIME: INVEST IN KIDS
1334 G Street, NW
Suite
B
Washington, DC 20005-3107
(202) 638-0690
Fax (202) 638-0673
www.fightcrime.org
-
project of the Action A
of Crime and Violenes Education Fund
01/16/1998 16:09
202-638-0673
FIGHT CRIME
PAGE 05
COPY
FIGHT CRIME: INVEST IN KIDS
page 2 of 2
"A New Consensus on Child Card & After-School Programs"
"We could be saving thousands of lives - and sparing thousands of families unimaginable
heartbreak - by investing up front in the proven early childhood care and youth development
programs that can turn kids away from crime by teaching them the values and skills to succeed."
- Jean Lewis, president,
Nat'l Organization of Parents of Murdered Children
for FIGHT CRIME: INVEST IN KIDS
"Everyone knows that the delivery of child care must take place not in our capitals but in our
communities, through partnerships of schools, parents, businesses and community groups. But
there is no government responsibility more fundamental than protecting public safety. The
government can't meet that obligation without committing to major new initiatives and investing
public funds in these programs for kids."
- Elmhurst (IL) Police Chief John Millner,
for FIGHT CRIME: INVEST IN KIDS
"Today, the deficit which most threatens America's families is the crime prevention deficit. -
the gaping shortfall in our investment in the programs proven to prevent crime by helping at-
risk kids get the right start."
- former U.S. Attorney General Elliot L. Richardson,
for FIGHT CRIME: INVEST IN KIDS
The Bottom Line from a law enforcement perspective: Clinton's child care proposal is a
major step forward which would substantially reduce crime. All members of Congress,
regardless of party or ideology, should view his proposal as a minimum floor, and expand on it to
provide more funding for after-school programs, Head Start, and quality child care for those
children who are otherwise most at risk of getting into trouble.
For more information on the powerful crime-prevention impact of early
childhood care and after-school programs, refer to the enclosed 3-page
fact sheet. Additional Information, and interviews, are available by calling
(202) 638-0690, or at http://www.fightcrime.org/.
01/16/1998 16:09
202-638-0673
FIGHT CRIME
PAGE 06
NATIONAL ADVISORY
President
COMMITTEE
Sanford A. Newman
FIGHT
INVEST
POLICE
Associate Directors
Philip Arreola
Amy A. Dawson
Chief. Tacoma, WA
CRIME
IN KIDS
Brendan J. Fitzsimons
Sherman Block
Sherilf, LA County, CA
Communicatione Direc
William Bratton
John W. Bartlett
Fmr. Commiss'r., NYC
Sam A. Cabrel
President, Int'l Union of
Police Ass'ns, AFL-CIO
For Immediate Release
CONTACT: John W. Bartlett
Dean M. Esserman
Wednesday, January 14, 1998, 10:00 a.m.
(202) 638-0690
Chief, Metro North, NY
Th
as C. Frazier
Police Commissioner,
Ballimore, MD
Police, Prosecutors, Crime Victims: Clinton Child Care
Gilbert G. Gallegos
President, Fraternal
Proposal Would Be Powerful Blow Against Crime
Order of Police
E. Douglas Hamilton
Congress Should 'See and Raise' Clinton's Bid
Chief. Louisville. KY
Phil E. Keith
Chief. Knoxville, TN
"Passage of President Clinton's proposal on early childhood care and after-school
R. Gli Kerllkowske
Commissioner, Buffalo, NY
programs would be among the most important and powerful anti-crime steps ever taken
Charles A. Moose
by Congress," says Sanford A. Newman, President of FIGHT CRIME: INVEST IN KIDS
Chief. Portland, OR
Patrick V. Murphy
a bi-partisan, national anti-crime organization led by police chiefs, prosecutors and
Former Commiss'r, NYC,
crime survivors.
DC, Detroh, Syrecuse
Dennis E. Nowicki
Chief, Charlotte, NC
"If Congress wants to really unleash America's most powerful anti-crime weapons, it
Reuban B. Ortega
Chief, Salt Lake City, UT
should 'see and raise' Clinton's opening bid," Newman said. "We urge Congress to view
Mett L. Rodriguez
Fmr. Police Supil, Chicago, IL
the President's proposal as a floor; proposals seeking a substantial reduction in crime
Jo h Samuels
should certainly not drop below this floor."
Chief. Oakland, CA
Darrell Sandera
Chief, Frankfort, IL
"We guarantee criminals taxpayer-provided room and board in a jail cell. Shouldn't we
Darrel W. Stephens
Fmr. Chief, SI. Petersburg. FL
be just as ready to prevent crime by guaranteeing good child care to toddlers and
Patrick J. Sullivan, Jr.
quality after-school programs for older kids?" remarked Buffalo (NY) Police
Sheriff, Arepahoe Co., CO
Donald H. Warshaw
Commissioner Gil Kerlikowske, president of the Police Executive Research Forum.
Chief, Miemi, FL
Robert S. Warshaw
Chief. Rochester. NY
"We could be saving thousands of lives - and sparing thousands of families
Elizabeth M. Watson
unimaginable heartbreak - by investing up front in the proven early childhood care and
Former Chief, Auslin, TX
youth development programs that can turn kids away from crime by teaching them the
PROSECUTORS
values and skills to succeed," said Jean Lewis, president of the National Organization
Ronald Earle
of Parents of Murdered Children. Ms. Lewis' son Scott was murdered in 1981.
District Atty., Travis Co., TX
Norman S. Early, Jr.
Former D.A., Denver. CO
Ralph C. Martin, 11
After-school hours are "prime time for Juvenlle crime." FBI data show that violent
District Ally., Suttolk Co., MA
juvenile crime triples in the hour after school lets out; the peak hours are between 3:00 p.m.
Jack O'Malley
Fmr. State's Ally., Cook Co., IL
and 6:00 p.m. These are also the peak hours for teen experimentation with sex and drugs.
Elliot L. Richardson
Former Attorney General
and Secretary of HEW, of
"Investments in quality early childhood development and after-school programs for at-
Defense and of Commerce
Jim Ryan
risk kids are our most powerful weapons against crime. The first after-school program
Attorney General. IL
we started cut neighborhood crime 42 percent the first year," said Baltimore (MD)
GI I Woods
Attorney General, AZ
Police Commissioner Thomas C. Frazier. "When the peak hours of crime are from 2:00
CRIME SURVIVORS
p.m. to 8:00 p.m., and when studies show that shutting at-risk kids out of quality early
childhood care can multiply by up to ten times their risk of delinquency by their mid-
Frances Davis
Fdr., Mothers of All Children
teens, it's just common sense to fight crime by investing in early childhood care and
Ellen Halbert
after-school programs."
Eatlor, National Crime
Victime Report
Carole Grant Hall
Studies show dramatic impact of early childhood care on crime. For example,
Director. Ginger Ridge
Residents' Initiative
two studies compared kids randomly assigned to receive quality early childhood care
Marc Kleas
Fdr., Klaas Fdn. for Children
or to do without it. The results: Denying these services multiplied by ten times the risk
Dennis Lees, Ph.D.
of later delinquency and by five times the risk the kids would become chronic
Mgr., Mental Health Clinic
lawbreakers as adults.
Jean Lewis
President, Parents of
Murdered Children
Gordon Rondeau &
"Everyone knows that the delivery of child care must take place not in our capitals but in
Elaine Rondeau
our communities, through partnerships of schools, parents, businesses and community
Founders, Action America:
Murder Must End Now
MORE
1334
G
Street,
NW
Suite
B
Washington, DC 20005-3107
(202) 638-0690
Fax
(202)
638-0673
www.fightcrime.org
A project of the Action Against Crime and Violence Education Fund
01/16/1998 16:09
202-638-0673
FIGHT CRIME
PAGE 07
FIGHT CRIME: INVEST IN KIDS
page 2 of 2
Police, Prosecutors, Crime Victims: Clinton Child Care
Proposal Would Be Powerful Blow Against Crime'
groups," said John Millner, Chief of Police in Elmhurst, Illinois. "But there is no government
responsibility more fundamental than protecting public safety. The government can't meet that
obligation without committing the funds so every community can ensure that early childhood
care and after-school programs reach all the kids that need them."
Emerging Unanimity Among Law Enforcement Leaders. One of the most striking
developments of the past year has been the emergence of virtual unanimity among police,
prosecutors, crime victims and criminologists - crossing all ideological lines - - that investments
in quality early childhood development and after-school programs are among our most
powerful weapons against crime.
Frazier noted that in a Northeastern University poll of police chiefs nation-wide
More than nine out of ten police chiefs (92%) agreed "America could sharply
reduce crime if government invested more in programs to help children and youth
get a good start" by "fully funding Head Start for infants and toddlers and
providing after-school programs and mentoring" for older kids.
Police chiefs chose "increasing investment in programs that help all children and
youth get a good start" as the "most effective" anti-crime strategy nearly 4-to-1
over "trying more juveniles as adults" or even "hiring additional police officers."
Can we afford such Investments? Early childhood care and after-school programs actually
save millions of taxpayer dollars. In one study, early childhood care prevented $150,000 per child
in later crime costs. And the human dividends the lives saved, and the sense of safety we
could have again in our communities - - are priceless.
"The President's funding for child care is a major step forward, but still meets only a portion of
the need. When child care and after-school programs save dollars and cut crime, why shouldn't
Congress provide the funding that will enable communities to get the job done?" said former
U.S. Attorney General Elliot L. Richardson, one of FIGHT CRIME's founders.
The Bottom Line from a law enforcement perspective: Clinton's child care
proposal is a major step forward which would substantially reduce crime. All
members of Congress, regardless of party or ideology, should view his proposal as
a minimum floor, and expand on it to provide more funding for after-school
programs, Head Start, and quality child care for those children who are otherwise
most at risk of getting into trouble.
For more Information on the powerful crime-prevention impact of early
childhood care and after-school programs, call (202) 638-0690, or visit
http://www.flghtcrime.org/ on the Internet.
BOBBIE GREENE
Jen/Nicole,
Thought this
would be of
interest.
-
Nicole
FYI. Please
return.
I
Jen
NATIONAL ADVISORY
President
COMMITTEE
FIGHT
INVEST
Sanford A. Newman
Associate Directors
POLICE
CRIME
IN KIDS
Amy R. Dawson
Philip Arreola
Brendan J. Fitzsimons
Chief, Tacoma, WA
Sherman Block
Media Director
Sheriff, LA County, CA
William Bratton
Fmr. Commiss'r., NYC
- Comparisons of quality V. non quality?
John W. Bartlett
Sam A. Cabral
President, Int'l Union of
- what does qualtu mean?
NATIONAL CRIME AND
Police Ass'ns, AFL-CIO
Dean M. Esserman
VIOLENCE PREVENTION
Chief, Metro North, NY
Gilbert G. Gallegos
President, Fraternal
9/10
RESOURCE COUNCIL
Barbara T. Bowman, M.A.
Order of Police
President, Erickson Institute of
E. Douglas Hamilton
Advanced Study in Child
Chief, Louisville, KY
Development
Phil E. Keith
Chief, Knoxville, TN
Hi, Gening
John A. Calhoun, M.P.A.
Executive Director, National
R. Gil Kerlikowske
Crime Prevention Council
Commissioner, Buffalo, NY
Talmadge N. Moore
Donald J. Cohen, M.D.
Chief, Ft. Wayne, IN
Director, Yale Child Study
Charles A. Moose
Center
Chief, Portland, OR
Sanford Dornbusch, Ph.D.
Patrick V. Murphy
Professor Emeritus, Stanford;
Former Commiss'r, NYC,
Thought this new report
Advisory Board Chair, Stanford
DC, Detroit, Syracuse
Center on Adolescence
Dennis E. Nowicki
Craig W. Floyd
Chief, Charlotte-
Chair, National Law Enforce-
Mecklenburg, NC
ment Officers Memorial Fund
Matt L. Rodriguez
Superintendent, Chicago, IL
Joseph Samuels
on after-school programs &
James A. Fox, Ph.D.
Dean, College of Criminal
Justice, Northeastern University
Chief, Oakland, CA
John W. Gardner, Ph.D.
Darrel W. Stephens
Fmr. Chief, St. Petersburg,
FL jussice crime which we
Former US Secretary of Health,
Education, and Welfare;
Patrick J. Sullivan, Jr.
Consulting Professor, Stanford
Sheriff, Arapahoe Co., CO
Richard Gerber, M.D.
Donald H. Warshaw
Chief, Miami, FL
parentedata preas comprence
Associate Clinical Professor of
Psychiatry, GWU Med. School
Robert S. Warshaw
Alice S. Honig, Ph.D.
Chief, Rochester, NY
Elizabeth M. Watson
Former Chief, Austin, TX
with the Attorney General this
Professor Emerita, Child
Development, Syracuse Univ.
Thomas C. Joe, M.A.
PROSECUTORS
Director, Center for the
Study of Social Policy
Ronald Earle
District Atty., Travis Co., TX
A.M. would be finterest
J. Ronald Lally, Ed.D.
Dir., Ctr. for Child and Family
Norman S. Early, Jr.
Studies, Far West Laboratory
Former D.A., Denver, CO
Ralph C. Martin, II
Jack O'Malley
you'll also be Interested, I
Steven Marans, Ph.D.
Director, Program on Child
District Atty., Suffolk Co., MA
Development-Community
Policing, Yale Child Study Ctr.
Fmr. State's Atty., Cook Co.,
"think IL in the materials behind
Ray Marshall, Ph.D.
Elliot L. Richardson
Former US Secretary of Labor;
Former US Attorney General
Chair in Economics and Public
and Secretary of HEW, of
Affairs, Univ. of Texas Austin
Defense and of Commerce
Jack McDevitt, Ph.D.
Grant Woods
Attorney General, AZ
tabs 2, 6 & 7 of the bound
Professor, College of Criminal
Justice, Northeastern Univ.:
Co-Director, Center for Criminal
CRIME SURVIVORS
Justice Policy Research
Lisbeth B. Schorr
Frances Davis
press Kit.
Lecturer in Social Medicine,
Fdr., Mothers of All Children
Harvard University
Ellen Halbert
David P. Weikart, Ph.D.
Editor, National Crime
President, High/Scope
Victims Report
Ja you nextweek
Educational Research Fdn.
Carole Grant Hall
Bernice Weissbourd
Director, Ginger Ridge
Residents' Initiative
President, Family Resource
Marc Klaas
Council
Fdr., Klaas Fdn. for Children
Richard Weissbourd, Ph.D.
Dennis Lees, Ph.D.
Professor, Kennedy School of
Mgr., Mental Health Clinic
Jean Lewis
Gordon Rondeau &
Sandy Haman
Government, Harvard
Chuck Wexler, Ph.D.
President, Parents of
Executive Director, Police
Murdered Children
Executive Research Forum
Edward Zigler, Ph.D.
Elaine Rondeau
Director, Bush Center in Child
Founders, Action America:
Development and Social Policy,
Murder Must End Now
Yale University
1334 G Street, NW
Suite B
Washington, DC 20005-3107
(202) 638-0690
Fax (202) 638-0673
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A project of the Action Against Crime and Violence Education Fund
FLIRT Crime: Invest in kids
FIGHT CRIME: NVEST IN KIDS
President
Sanford A. Newman
Associate Directors
Amy R. Dawson
Brendan J. Fitzsimons
Development Director
John W. Bartlett
Police, Prosecutors, and
Crime Survivors
Fighting for Policies to
Prevent Crime and Violence
After-School Programs or After-School Crime
Wednesday, September 10, 1997, 10:00 a.m.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
List of Speakers
1
Press Release
2
Speakers' Biographies
3
FIGHT CRIME Fact Sheet
4
National Advisory Committee and Resource Council
5
National Poll of Police Chiefs
6
Effective Crime Prevention Programs: Sample Graphs
7
Crime Prevention Legislative Fact Sheet
8
Crime Statistics and Trends Fact Sheet
9
Selected Press Clips
10
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A project of the Action Against Crime and Violence Education Fund
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1
Divider Title:
President
NATIONAL ADVISORY
COMMITTEE
FIGHT
INVEST
Sanford A. Newman
POLICE
Associate Directors
Philip Arreola
Chief, Tacoma, WA
CRIME
IN KIDS
Amy R. Dawson
Brendan J. Fitzsimons
Sherman Block
Elissa Rumsey
Sheriff, LA County, CA
William Bratton
Fmr. Commiss'r., NYC
Sam A. Cabral
President, Int'l Union of
Police Ass'ns, AFL-CIO
Gerald A. Cooper
Fmr. Chief, Evanston, IL
Dean M. Esserman
Chief, Metro North. NY
Gilbert G. Gallegos
President, Fraternal
Order of Police
E. Douglas Hamilton
Chief, Louisville, KY
Phil E. Keith
FIGHT CRIME: INVEST IN KIDS
Chief. Knoxville, TN
R. Gil Kerlikowske
After-School Programs or After-School Programs
Commissioner. Buffalo, NY
September 10, 1997
Talmadge N. Moore
Chief, Ft. Wayne, IN
Charles A. Moose
Chief, Portland, OR
Order of Speakers
Patrick V. Murphy
Former Commiss'r, NYC,
DC, Detroit, Syracuse
Sanford Newman
Dennis E. Nowicki
Chief, Charlotte-
Mecklenburg, NC
Nicholas Pastore
Phil Keith
Chief, New Haven, CT
Matt L. Rodriguez
Superintendent, Chicago, IL
Jean Lewis
Joseph Samuels
Chief, Oakland, CA
Darrel W. Stephens
Chief, St. Petersburg, FL
Ralph Martin
Patrick J. Sullivan, Jr.
Sheriff, Arapahoe Co., CO
Donald H. Warshaw
Patrick Sullivan
Chief, Miami, FL
Robert S. Warshaw
Chief, Rochester, NY
Elizabeth M. Watson
Ellen Halbert
Chief, Austin, TX
PROSECUTORS
Janet Reno
Ronald Earle
District Atty., Travis Co., TX
Norman S. Early, Jr.
Former D.A., Denver, CO
Jack O'Malley
State's Atty., Cook Co., IL
Ralph C. Martin, II
District Atty., Suttolk Co., MA
Elliot L. Richardson
Former Attorney General
and Secretary of HEW, of
Defense and of Commerce
Grant Woods
Attorney General, AZ
CRIME SURVIVORS
Frances Davis
Fdr., Mothers of All Children
Ellen Halbert
Vice-Chair, Texas Board of
Criminal Justice
Carole Grant Hall
Director, Ginger Ridge
Residents' Initiative
Marc Klass
Fdr., Klaas Fdn. for Children
Dennis Lees, Ph.D.
Mgr., Mental Health Clinic
Jean Lewis
President, Parents of
Murdered Children
Gordon Rondeau &
Elaine Rondeau
Founders, Action America:
Murder Must End Now
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A project of the Action Against Crime and Violence Education Fund
150
Clinton Presidential Records
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digitization capabilities, we are sometimes unable to adequately
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indicated below.
2
Divider Title:
President
NATIONAL ADVISORY
COMMITTEE
FIGHT
INVEST
Sanford A. Newman
POLICE
Associate Directors
Philip Arreola
Chief, Tacoma, WA
CRIME
IN KIDS
Amy R. Dawson
Brendan J. Fitzsimons
Sherman Block
Elissa Rumsey
Sheriff, LA County. CA
William Bratton
Fmr. Commiss'r., NYC
Sam A. Cabral
President, Int'l Union of
Police Ass'ns, AFL-CIO
EMBARGOED
CONTACT: John Bartlett
Gerald A. Cooper
Fmr. Chief, Evanston, IL
for Wednesday, Sept. 10, 1997, 10 a.m.
(202) 638-0690
Dean M. Esserman
Chief, Metro North, NY
Gilbert G. Gallegos
President, Fraternal
Crime Fighters Hand Report to Reno:
Order of Police
E. Douglas Hamilton
Chief. Louisville, KY
After-School Hours Are
Phil E. Keith
Chief, Knoxville, TN
R. Gil Kerlikowske
Prime Time for Juvenile Crime
Commissioner, Buffalo, NY
Talmadge N. Moore
Chief, Ft. Wayne, IN
Charles A. Moose
Sweeping New Report Shows After-School Programs
Chief, Portland, OR
Patrick V. Murphy
Could Sharply Cut Youth Crime
Former Commiss'r, NYC.
DC, Detroit, Syracuse
Dennis E. Nowicki
Law Enforcement Leaders and Crime Victims Urge Congress to Invest In Kids
Chief, Charlotte-
Mecklenburg, NC
Nicholas Pastore
[Washington, D.C.] Far more juvenile crime takes place in the hours immediately following
Chief, New Haven, CT
Matt L. Rodriguez
school dismissal than late at night, reveals a new report presented to Attorney General
Superintendent, Chicago, IL
Joseph Samuels
Janet Reno today by FIGHT CRIME: INVEST IN KIDS, the national crime prevention
Chief, Oakland, CA
Darrel W. Stephens
Chief, St. Petersburg, FL
organization of police, prosecutors and crime survivors. The report finds that Congress
Patrick J. Sullivan, Jr.
Sheriff, Arapahoe Co., CO
could sharply reduce crime by increasing access to quality after-school programs and other
Donald H. Warshaw
Chief, Miami, FL
programs for children and youth proven to cut crime.
Robert S. Warshaw
Chief, Rochester, NY
Speaking at The Other Way, a school providing alternative education programs for at-
Elizabeth M. Watson
Chief, Austin, TX
risk youth in Montgomery County, Maryland, leaders in law enforcement and victims'
PROSECUTORS
Ronald Earle
advocacy presented the report to Reno and pointed to the powerful evidence that
District Atty., Travis Co., TX
Norman S. Early, Jr.
investments in children and youth can dramatically reduce crime.
Former D.A., Denver, CO
Jack O'Malley
Reno said the report's conclusions "reinforce my commitment to excellent, effective
State's Atty., Cook Co., IL
Ralph C. Martin, II
after-school programs. To reduce juvenile crime, we just go where the crime is, and help
District Atty., Suffolk Co., MA
Elliot L. Richardson
Former Attorney General
communities steer their at-risk kids toward healthier, more productive choices."
and Secretary of HEW, of
Defense and of Commerce
The report, based on newly-available comprehensive FBI data from eight states, confirms
Grant Woods
Attorney General, AZ
that the peak hours for violent juvenile crime are between 3:00 PM and 8:00 PM. "When
CRIME SURVIVORS
Frances Davis
the school bell rings, leaving millions of young people without responsible adult
Fdr., Mothers of All Children
Ellen Halbert
supervision or constructive activities, juvenile crime suddenly triples and prime time for
Vice-Chair, Texas Board of
Criminal Justice
juvenile crime begins," it concludes.
Carole Grant Hall
Director, Ginger Ridge
Focusing on days when school is in session - which account for 57% of violent crime
Residents' Initiative
Marc Klaas
committed by juveniles — the report finds that nearly half of all such violent juvenile crime
Fdr., Klaas Fdn. for Children
Dennis Lees, Ph.D.
Mgr., Mental Health Clinic
takes place during the six hour period between 2:00 PM and 8:00 PM, and nearly two
Jean Lewis
President, Parents of
thirds takes place during the nine hours between 2:00 PM and 11:00 PM. In contrast,
Murdered Children
Gordon Rondeau &
Elaine Rondeau
Founders, Action America:
Murder Must End Now
1
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project of the Action Against Crime and Violence Education Fund
150
just one-seventh occurs during the eight hours from 11:00 PM to 7:00 AM, the period for which curfew
laws are sometimes suggested.
The law enforcement leaders and crime victims who presented the report to Reno criticized Congress'
neglect of crime prevention in bills Congress is expected to finalize over the next few weeks.
"If Congress really wants to win the war on crime, it should sharply boost investments in the proven
programs for kids that can keep them from ever becoming criminals - like the after-school programs that we
know can give them alternatives to the street." said Knoxville (TN) Chief of Police Phil Keith. "Those are
our most powerful weapons against crime - and the ones that can most effectively stop crime before people
get hurt."
"What happened to me didn't have to happen," said Ellen Halbert of Austin, Texas, who was
brutally raped, beaten with a hammer and stabbed repeatedly by an intruder in her home. "If Congress were
investing in programs like good schools and after-school programs, and the even earlier interventions we
know can give kids the right start, I probably wouldn't have needed those 600 stitches and all those
surgeries to repair the damage."
Halbert served as Vice-Chair of the Texas Board of Criminal Justice from 1993 to 1997 - the first
crime victim to serve on the board. She is a 1997 recipient of the National Crime Victims' Service Award,
the highest Federal honor for a crime victim or victim advocate.
"Ignoring prevention investments leaves us stuck on a treadmill, running faster and faster to put
people in jail while kids are turned into criminals faster than we can lock them up," said Suffolk County
(MA) District Attorney Ralph Martin, the first Republican to hold that position. "The back-end strategy
of arrest and incarceration is incomplete without front-end investments that we know can help kids and
keep Americans safe."
The 'war on crime' will never be won until we cut the enemy's most important supply line: its ability to
turn kids into criminals," Martin added. "That's going to take greater investments in school-based and
after-school programs that identify at-risk kids earlier, and give them the armor of values and skills they
need to ward off the seduction of gangs and violence."
"To make America safe, we need to be as willing to guarantee our kids space in an after-school or
job training program as we are to guarantee a criminal room and board in a prison cell," said Jean Lewis,
President of the National Organization of Parents of Murdered Children. "The verdict is in. If we
want to do more than flex our muscles and talk about crime - if we want to really keep Americans safe
- we must start investing in the programs we know can steer kids down the right path."
RENO, CRIME FIGHTERS: PREVENTION MUST BE CORNERSTONE OF JUVENILE CRIME BILLS
As Congress continues its work on juvenile crime legislation, Attorney General Reno emphasized the
power of preventive investments and the overwhelming support for these measures from America's crime
fighters. Law enforcement leaders nationwide have expressed concern over the failure of current juvenile
crime initiatives - especially the pending appropriations for after-school programs and the Senate's
juvenile crime bill (S. 10), which was approved by the Senate Judiciary Committee in July and expected to
2
be considered by the full Senate in the next few weeks - to provide funding for crime-prevention
investments.
"Police leaders know America's commitment to putting criminals in jail must be matched by its
commitment to keeping kids from becoming criminals in the first place," said Keith, citing a poll by
Northeastern University's Center for Criminal Justice Policy Research in which police chiefs
nationwide, when asked to rank crime reduction strategies, picked "increasing investment in programs
that help all children and youth get a good start" as the "most effective" nearly 4-to-1 over all other
options, including "trying more juveniles as adults."
RESULTS OF THIS NATIONAL POLL OF POLICE CHIEFS ARE AVAILABLE
"When Congress fails to support these proven crime-prevention programs, they force us to fight
with one hand tied behind our backs," said Arapahoe County (CO) Sheriff Patrick Sullivan, who
serves on the Board of Directors of the National Sheriffs' Association. "Congress can invest in the
programs shown to dramatically reduce crime, or it can wait for more innocent Americans to get hurt or
killed and then pretend that prisons are a substitute for prevention."
The Senate's juvenile crime bill, sponsored by Judiciary Committee Chairman Orrin Hatch (R-UT),
authorizes $703 million annually in new funding, but earmarks none of the money for prevention. FIGHT
CRIME: INVEST IN KIDS estimates that only about 9 percent of the new funds in the bill would wind up
being used for prevention - far less than is needed to have a significant crime-prevention impact.
ANALYSIS OF THE BILLS' CRIME PREVENTION IMPACT AVAILABLE
"These bills, with their wait-for-the-crime approaches, shortchange both the effective programs
proven to prevent crime by helping kids get the right start so they never become criminals, and the
intensive help that can steer kids back on track when they first begin to get into trouble," said Sanford
Newman, President of FIGHT CRIME: INVEST IN KIDS and the report's co-author (with James Alan
Fox, Ph.D., Dean of the College of Criminal Justice at Northeastern University).
"These bills claim they'll stop crime by building more prisons; that's like saying we can cure death by
building more cemeteries. It's too little, too late, for too many Americans," said Marc Klaas, whose
daughter Polly was abducted from her Petaluma, Ca., home and murdered in 1993. "When our
Congressional representatives ignore our most effective weapons against crime, the way I see it, they're
being soft on crime."
"When police chiefs hear someone say we can't afford investments in programs that help kids get
the right start, we see more bright yellow crime scene tape, more prisons, and thousands of good men
and women and boys and girls lying in pools of blood," said Patrick Murphy, former Police
Commissioner in New York City, Detroit, Washington D.C. and Syracuse.
3
"We'll win the war on crime when we're ready to invest our tax dollars in America's most
vulnerable kids, instead of waiting until they become America's most wanted criminals," said Buffalo
Police Commissioner Gil Kerlikowske.
OVERWHELMING EVIDENCE: INVESTMENTS IN KIDS DRAMATICALLY CUT CRIME
Newman cited other studies showing that investments in at-risk kids of all ages can cut crime rates
dramatically. For example:
A study of a 32-month after-school recreation program in a Canadian public housing project
found that crime dropped 75% in the project that received the program compared with previous years,
while crime jumped 67% in a nearby project that didn't have the program.
Denying at-risk high school kids participation in a special "Quantum Opportunities Program" of
counseling, academic and life-skills support and other incentives quadrupled their risk of being arrested
while in high school. But participation made them more than twice as likely to graduate and one-third
more likely to go on to post-secondary schooling.
Participation in a quality mentoring program like Big Brothers/Big Sisters has been shown to cut in
half the risk that 10- to 16-year-olds will start using drugs, according to a study by Public/Private
Ventures. The study also showed that children without mentors were more likely to start using alcohol, and
used hitting as a way to settle disputes twice as often as Little Brothers/Little Sisters.
A High/Scope Foundation study in Ypsilanti, Mich., showed that at-risk toddlers denied a
program of quality child care and a home visit by a parenting coach were five times more likely to be
chronic offenders by age 27 than those provided these services.
A Syracuse University study found that providing quality early-childhood programs to families until
children reached age five cut those kids' risk of being delinquent as teenagers by 90 percent.
Another recent study showed that child abuse and neglect doubles kids chances of becoming
chronic lawbreakers as adults. The good news is that programs offering parenting coaching to at-risk
parents who want it have been shown to reduce abuse and neglect by up to 80 percent.
Even when youths begin to get in trouble, we don't have to throw in the towel. Studies in Utah
and South Carolina have shown that family-based therapy for first-time offenders cut in half not only
their chances of recidivism, but also the risk that their siblings would become delinquent.
DATA ON THE ANTI-CRIME EFFECTIVENESS OF PROGRAMS FOR CHILDREN AVAILABLE
"We could be saving thousands of lives - and sparing thousands of families unimaginable
heartbreak - by investing up front in the proven programs for kids that can turn them away from
crime," said National Parents of Murdered Children President Jean Lewis. "Anything less is too little,
too late, for too many Americans."
END
4
Clinton Presidential Records
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3
Divider Title:
FILIT Crime: Invest in kids
FIGHT CRIME: INVEST IN KIDS
President
Sanford A. Newman
Associate Directors
Amy R. Dawson
Brendan J. Fitzsimons
Communications Director
John W. Bartlett
PRESENTATION OF NEW JUVENILE CRIME REPORT TO
ATTORNEY GENERAL RENO
September 10, 1997
Participant Biographies
James Alan Fox, Ph.D.
Boston, Massachusetts
Dr. James Alan Fox is Dean and Professor of the College of Criminal Justice at Northeastern
University in Boston. He has published twelve books on violence in America, as well as dozens
of journal and magazine articles and newspaper columns, primarily in the areas of multiple
murder, juvenile crime, workplace violence, and capital punishment.
As an authority on homicide, he appears regularly on television and radio programs around the
country, including 48 Hours, 20/20, The Today Show, and network newscasts, as well as talk
shows like Oprah and Donahue. He was recently profiled in a two-part cover story in USA
Today, entitled "The Dean of Death."
Fox often gives lectures and expert testimony, including four appearances before the United
States Congress, a White House meeting with President Clinton and Vice President Gore on
youth violence, and a private briefing to Attorney General Reno on trends in juvenile violence.
Ellen Halbert
Austin, Texas
Ellen Halbert's involvement in criminal justice began after a brutal attack she suffered in 1986,
when an intruder broke into her home and repeatedly raped her, stabbed her three times in the
neck and the chest and hit her ten times with a hammer before pounding a knife into her skull
and leaving her for dead. In 1991, Ms. Halbert became the first crime victim to be appointed to
the Texas Board of Criminal Justice, which oversees the massive Texas Criminal Justice System
of prisons, parole supervision and probation. In 1997, after serving as the Texas Board's Vice
Chair, Ms. Halbert received the prestigious Crime Victims' Service Award from the Justice
Department's Office of Victims of Crime, the highest federal honor for a crime victim or
victims' advocate.
Phil E. Keith
Knoxville, Tennessee
Phil Keith is the Chief of Police of the Knoxville Police Department. During his 24 years
working in criminal justice, public safety, and business administration, he has had numerous
high-level, policy-making positions. During Chief Keith's tenure, the department has become
nationally accredited and has been selected as a national demonstration site for community
policing.
1334 G Street, NW
Suite B
Washington, DC 20005-3107
(202) 638-0690
Fax (202) 638-0673
E-mail: [email protected]
A project of the Action Against Crime and Violence Education Fund
Crime:
Invest
in
FIGHT CRIME: NVEST IN KIDS
President
Fight
Sanford A. Newman
Kids
Associate Directors
Amy R. Dawson
Brendan J. Fitzsimons
Communications Director
John W. Bartlett
Chief Keith has been recognized as Officer of the Year, Law Enforcement Educator of the Year
and the nationally acclaimed Planner of the Year award. He is recognized around the country as
an expert in patrol safety, juvenile justice issues, organizational development strategies and
training and development of personnel. In 1994, Mr. Keith served on the U.S. Conference of
Mayors Crime Task Force, comprised of six mayors and six police chiefs representing
considerable involvement in the 1994 Crime Bill.
Jean Lewis
Sarasota, Florida
Jean Lewis founded the Peninsula/South Bay, California, chapter of Parents of Murdered
Children (POMC) in 1981, one year after her son was murdered. She led POMC for eight years
and served as the POMC California State Coordinator for four years.
Ms. Lewis, a former school teacher, facilitates POMC retreats around the country, and presents
workshops about the aftermath of murder at various trainings and conferences. She also teaches
at the National Victim Service Academy and is serving her third year as President of the National
Board of Trustees of Parents of Murdered Children.
Ralph C. Martin, II
Boston, Massachusetts
Ralph C. Martin II, of Boston, is the first African-American and Republican to serve as the
District Attorney for Suffolk County - the busiest and largest district attorney's office in New
England. Since his appointment in 1992 (he was re-elected in 1994), Martin has initiated a
variety of reforms with the goal of making the prosecutor's office more accessible and more
proactive in the fight against crime. These initiatives include the state's first Safe Neighborhood
Initiative, a Children's Advocacy Center, the Community Based Juvenile Justice Program and
the Juvenile Priority Prosecution Program.
Patrick V. Murphy
Washington, D.C.
In more than 51 years of law enforcement, Patrick V. Murphy has served as the Police
Commissioner of New York City; Washington, D.C.; Syracuse; and Detroit - more major cities
than anyone else in U.S. history. In between, he headed the federal government's Law
Enforcement Assistance Administration.
Murphy later headed the Police Foundation, the F.B.I. Law Enforcement Bulletin noted that his
"long-range impact on American policing nationally probably will be judged by students of
police history as significant as that of J. Edgar Hoover." He is currently the Director of the
Police Policy Board of the U.S. Conference of Mayors and Chair of the Montgomery County
(MD) Criminal Justice Coordinating Commission. He holds a Masters Degree in Public
Administration and graduated from the FBI National Academy. Mr. Murphy is widely
considered to be "the father of community policing and has written numerous articles on
policing as well as teaching at the John Jay College of Criminal Justice.
1334 G Street, NW
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Washington, DC 20005-3107
(202) 638-0690
Fax (202) 638-0673
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A project of the Action Against Crime and Violence Education Fund
FILL Crime: Invest in kids
FIGHT CRIME: INVEST IN KIDS
Presi it
Sanford A. Newman
Associate Directors
Amy R. Dawson
Brendan J. Fitzsimons
Communications Director
John W. Bartlett
Mr. Murphy's emphasis on hard-nosed research to learn what works and his commitment to
implementing research findings have won international acclaim, including a special award from
the Queen of England for his service in assisting Scotland Yard. Mr. Murphy serves as a
member of the FIGHT CRIME: INVEST IN KIDS National Advisory Committee and Board of
Directors.
Sanford Newman
Takoma Park, Maryland
Sanford A. Newman is an attorney and the President of FIGHT CRIME: INVEST IN KIDS. His
commitment to this effort has been nourished by a belief in the potential of children, as well as
by his own experience of crime. He has twice been a victim serious crime, once when he was
mugged in a small town in Connecticut at the age of eighteen, and later when he and his wife
awoke in the middle of the night to find an intruder crouching between their bed and their
newborn's crib. Newman graduated form Wesleyan University in 1974 and the University of
Virginia Law School in 1977.
Janet Reno
Janet Reno was sworn in as the nation's 78th Attorney General by President Clinton on March
12, 1993. From 1978 to the time of her appointment, Ms. Reno served as the State Attorney for
Dade County, Florida. Ms. Reno was a partner in the Miami-based law firm of Steel, Hector &
Davis from 1976-1978. Before that, she served as an assistant state attorney and as Staff
Director of the Florida House of Representatives Judiciary Committee, after starting her legal
career in private practice.
Patrick J. Sullivan Jr.
Littleton, Colorado
Patrick Sullivan has been the Sheriff of Arapahoe County for the past 14 years. He has been
active in the National Sheriffs' Association as a member of the Board of Directors and as a
member of the Executive Committee. He was appointed as Sheriff of Arapahoe County in June
of 1983. He graduated from the F.B.I. National Academy in 1977 and from the National
Sheriffs' Institute in 1983. He was Chief Counter of the U.S. Army Intelligence Command from
1966 to 1969. and was a police officer in the Littleton, Colorado. Police Department from 1962
until 1966.
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and
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Education
Fund
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4
Divider Title:
President
NATIONAL ADVISORY
COMMITTEE
FIGHT
INVEST
Sanford A. Newman
POLICE
Associate Directors
Philip Arreola
Chief, Tacoma, WA
CRIME
IN KIDS
Amy R. Dawson
Brendan J. Fitzsimons
Sherman Block
Elissa Rumsey
Sheriff, LA County, CA
William Bratton
Fmr. Commiss'r NYC
Sam A. Cabral
FACT SHEET
President, Int'l Union of
Police Ass'ns. AFL-CIO
Gerald A. Cooper
WHAT
Fmr Chief, Evanston, IL
Dean M. Esserman
Chief, Metro North. NY
FIGHT CRIME: INVEST IN KIDS is a bipartisan, nonprofit crime prevention organization
Gilbert G. Gallegos
President, Fraternal
led by America's best-known police chiefs, prosecutors and crime survivors.
Order of Police
E. Douglas Hamilton
Chief, Louisville, KY
WHY
Phil E. Keith
Chief, Knoxville, TN
R. Gil Kerlikowske
Its mission is to help Americans understand that our most powerful weapons against
Commissioner, Buffalo, NY
Talmadge N. Moore
crime are the programs proven to keep kids from becoming criminals in the first place.
Chief, Ft. Wayne. IN
These include early childhood programs, quality Head Start and child care, prevention of
Charles A. Moose
child abuse and neglect, good schools and after-school programs, as well as programs
Chief, Portland, OR
Patrick V. Murphy
that nip delinquency in the bud by getting troubled kids back on track.
Former Commiss'r, NYC,
DC, Detroit, Syracuse
Dennis E. Nowicki
WHO
Chief, Charlotte-
Mecklenburg, NC
Nicholas Pastore
FIGHT CRIME is led by a National Advisory Committee that includes over two dozen
Chief, New Haven, CT
Matt L. Rodriguez
police chiefs and prosecutors, including the presidents of the Fraternal Order of Police,
Superintendent, Chicago, IL
the International Union of Police Associations, the International Association of Chiefs of
Joseph Samuels
Chief, Oakland, CA
Police, and the Police Executive Research Forum; former Attorney General Elliot
Darrel W. Stephens
Richardson; and such well-known crime survivors as Marc Klaas and the president of the
Chief, St. Petersburg. FL
Patrick J. Sullivan, Jr.
National Organization of Parents of Murdered Children.
Sheriff, Arapahoe Co., CO
Donald H. Warshaw
FIGHT CRIME: INVEST IN KIDS' National Advisory Committee is complemented by its
Chief, Miami, FL
Robert S. Warshaw
National Crime and Violence Prevention Resource Council which includes leading experts
Chief, Rochester, NY
in criminology, child development and law enforcement.
Elizabeth M. Watson
Chief, Austin, TX
PROSECUTORS
HOW
Ronald Earle
District Atty., Travis Co., TX
FIGHT CRIME: INVEST IN KIDS:
Norman S. Early, Jr.
Former D.A., Denver, CO
Develops policy recommendations and analyzes the crime-prevention impact of
Jack O'Malley
State's Atty., Cook Co., IL
public policy proposals.
Ralph C. Martin, II
Conducts local, state and national public education efforts about effective crime
District Atty., Suffolk Co., MA
Elliot L. Richardson
prevention programs.
Former Attorney General
Builds at the national, state and local levels leadership committees of police,
and Secretary of HEW, of
Defense and of Commerce
prosecutors and crime survivors as well as resource councils of experts in fields such
Grant Woods
as child and youth development, criminology and law enforcement.
Attorney General, AZ
Builds grassroots networks of individuals committed to educating their own neighbors
CRIME SURVIVORS
and public officials.
Frances Davis
Fdr., Mothers of All Children
Serves as an information clearinghouse for journalists, policy-makers and the
Ellen Halbert
public.
Vice-Chair, Texas Board of
Criminal Justice
Carole Grant Hall
BACKGROUND
Director, Ginger Ridge
Residents' Initiative
Marc Klaas
FIGHT CRIME: INVEST IN KIDS was launched in July, 1996.
Fdr., Klaas Fdn. for Children
Dennis Lees, Ph.D.
Mgr., Mental Health Clinic
Principal funding has come from: the Hitachi Foundation, the MacArthur Foundation, the
Jean Lewis
President, Parents of
Public Welfare Foundation, the Annie E. Casey Foundation, the Stern Family Fund, the
Murdered Children
Nathan Cummings Foundation, the Butler Family Fund, the Liz Claiborne and Art
Gordon Rondeau &
Elaine Rondeau
Ortenberg Foundation, the Harris Foundation, the Z. Smith Reynolds Foundation in North
Founders, Action America:
Carolina, and the Woods Fund of Illinois.
Murder Must End Now
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Washington, DC 20005-3107
(202) 638-0690
Fax (202) 638-0673
E-mail: [email protected]
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Divider Title:
FIGHT CRIME: NVES' IN K DS
NATIONAL ADVISORY COMMITTEE
(in formation)
Law Enforcement Leaders
Philip Arreola, Chief of Police, Tacoma, Washington; former Chief of Police, Milwaukee & Port Huron, WI.
Sherman Block, Sheriff, Los Angeles County, CA
William Bratton, Former Police Commissioner, NYC, and Boston, MA.
Sam A. Cabral, International President, International Union of Police Associations, AFL-CIO.
Gerald A. Cooper, former Chief of Police, Evanston, Illinois.
Dean M. Esserman, Chief of Police, Metro North, NY; former Assistant District Attorney, Kings Co., NY.
Gilbert G. Gallegos, National President, Fraternal Order of Police.
E. Douglas Hamilton, Chief of Police, Louisville, Kentucky.
Phil E. Keith, Chief of Police, Knoxville, Tennessee.
R. Gil Kerlikowske, Police Commiss'r, Buffalo, NY; President, Police Executive Research Forum; former Chief, Ft. Pierce, FL.
Talmadge N. Moore, Chief of Police, Fort Wayne, Indiana.
Charles A. Moose, Chief of Police, Portland, Oregon.
Patrick V. Murphy, Director, Police Policy Board, US Conference of Mayors; former President, Police Foundation; former
Chief of Police, New York City, Detroit, Washington, D.C., and Syracuse.
Dennis E. Nowicki, Chief of Police, Charlotte-Mecklenburg, North Carolina; Vice President, Police Executive Research Forum;
former Chief of Police, Joliet, IL.
Nicholas Pastore, Chief of Police, New Haven, Connecticut.
Matt L. Rodriguez, Superintendent of Police, Chicago, Illinois; Chairman, Major Cities Chiefs Association; Chairman, His-
panic Institute of Law Enforcement.
Joseph Samuels, Chief of Police, Oakland, CA.
Darrel W. Stephens, Chief of Police, St. Petersburg, Florida; former Chief of Police, Newport News, VA and Largo, FL, former
Executive Director, Police Executive Research Forum.
Patrick J. Sullivan, Jr.: Sheriff, Arapahoe County, Colorado; Board of Directors, National Sheriffs' Ass'n.
Donald H. Warshaw, Chief of Police, Miami, Florida.
Robert S. Warshaw, Chief of Police, Rochester, New York; former Chief of Police, Statesville, NC
Elizabeth M. Watson, Chief of Police, Austin, Texas; former Chief of Police, Houston, TX.
Prosecutors
Ronald Earle, District Attorney, Travis County, Texas.
Norman S. Early, Jr., Former District Attorney, Denver, Colorado.
Ralph C. Martin, II, District Attorney, Suffolk County, Massachusetts.
Jack O'Malley, State's Attorney, Cook County, Illinois.
Elliot L. Richardson, former US Attorney General, Secretary of Defense, Secretary of Health, Education and Welfare, and
Secretary of Commerce, former US Attorney and Attorney General of Massachusetts.
Grant Woods, Attorney General, Arizona.
Crime Survivors
Frances Davis, Founder, Mothers of all Children; Recipient, 1996 President's Crime Victims' Services Award. Ms. Davis lost
her three sons, Raleak, Andrew, and Frankie, and two nephews, Dwayne and Glennis, to murder.
Carole Grant Hall, Director, Ginger Ridge Residents' Initiative in Chicago; Ms. Hall's son Lateef was killed as he knelt to
protect a toddler from random crossfire.
Ellen Halbert, Vice-Chair of the Texas Board of Criminal Justice. Ms. Halbert was repeatedly raped, beaten with a hammer,
and stabbed in the head, neck and chest by an intruder in her home who left her for dead.
Marc Klaas, Founder of the Polly Klaas Foundation and the Marc Klaas Foundation for Children. His twelve-year old daughter
Polly was murdered after being abducted from her home in October, 1993.
Dennis Lees, Ph.D., Program Manager at a California Mental Health Department, former clinical social worker for abused and
neglected children and their families. His daughter Sarah was murdered by an intruder.
Jean Lewis, President, Parents of Murdered Children; Ms. Lewis' 21 year old son Scott was murdered in 1980.
Gordon and Elaine Rondeau, Co-founders of Action America: Murder Must End Now; Mr. Rondeau also heads an interna-
tional technology consulting firm. Their daughter Renee was strangled by an intruder in her apartment on Halloween, 1994.
1334 G Street, NW
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Washington, DC 20005-3107
(202) 638-0690
Fax (202) 638-0673
E-mail: [email protected]
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F GHT CRIM E: NVEST N K DS
President
Sanford A. Newman
Associate Directors
Amy R. Da on
NATIONAL CRIME AND VIOLENCE PREVENTION
Brendan J. Fitzsimons
RESOURCE COUNCIL
(in formation)
Barbara Bowman, M.A.: President, Erikson Institute of Advanced Study in Child Development.
John A. Calhoun, M.P.A.: Executive Director, National Crime Prevention Council; former
Commissioner of the Administration for Children, Youth, and Families; former Commissioner of
Youth Services in Massachusetts.
Donald Cohen, M.D.: Director, Yale Child Study Center; Irving B. Harris Professor of Child
Psychiatry, Pediatrics and Psychology; President, Int'l. Association of Child Adolescent Psychiatry and
Allied Professions.
Sanford M. Dornbusch, Ph.D.: Reed-Hodgson Professor Emeritus, Human Biology, Sociology, and
Education, Stanford University; Chair, Advisory Board of the Stanford Center on Adolescence; former
President, Society for Research On Adolescence.
Craig W. Floyd: Chairman, National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial Fund.
James Alan Fox, Ph.D.: Dean and Professor, College of Criminal Justice, Northeastern University.
John W. Gardner, Ph.D.: Consulting Professor, School of Education, Stanford University; former
U.S. Secretary of Health, Education, and Welfare.
Richard Gerber, M.D.: Associate Clinical Professor of Psychiatry, George Washington University
Medical School; Teaching Analyst, Washington Psychoanalytic Institute.
Alice Sterling Honig, Ph.D.: Professor Emerita, Child Development; former Program Director,
Syracuse University Children's Center; co-author of The Family Development Research Program
Longitudinal Follow-up Study.
Thomas. C. Joe: Director and founder, Center for the Study of Social Policy.
J. Ronald Lally, Ed.D.: Director, Center for Child and Family Studies, Far West Laboratory for
Educational Research and Development; former Program Director, The Family Development Research
Program Longitudinal Follow-up Study.
Steven Marans, Ph.D.: Director, Child Development-Community Policing, Yale Child Study Center.
Ray Marshall, Ph.D.: Rapoport Centennial Chair in Economics and Public Affairs, LBJ School of
Public Affairs, University of Texas at Austin; former U.S. Secretary of Labor.
Jack McDevitt, Ph.D.: Professor, College of Criminal Justice, Northeastern University; Co-Director,
Center for Criminal Justice Policy Research.
Lisbeth B. Schorr: School of Medicine, Harvard University; author of Within Our Reach: Breaking the
Cycle of Disadvantage.
David P. Weikart, Ph.D.: President, High/Scope Educational Research Foundation; Founder,
High/Scope Perry Preschool Project.
Bernice Weissbourd: President, Family Resource Council; founder, Family Focus; member, National
Commission on Children; former Vice President, Nat'l Assoc. for the Education of Young Children.
Richard Weissbourd, Ph.D.: Professor, Malcolm Wiener Center for Social Policy, John F. Kennedy
School of Government, Harvard University.
Chuck Wexler, Ph.D.: Executive Director, Police Executive Research Forum.
October 25. 1996
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6
Divider Title:
President
NATIONAL ADVISORY
COMMITTEE
FIGHT
INVEST
Sanford A. Newman
Associate Directors
POLICE
Philip Arreola
Chief, Tacoma, WA
CRIME
IN KIDS
Amy R. Dawson
Brendan J. Fitzsimons
Sherman Block
Elissa Rumsey
Sheriff, LA County, CA
William Bratton
Fmr. Commiss'r., NYC
Sam A. Cabral
President, Int'l Union of
Police Ass'ns, AFL-CIO
Gerald A. Cooper
Police Chiefs Say
Fmr. Chief, Evanston, IL
More Government Investments in Kids are
Dean M. Esserman
Chief, Metro North, NY
Key to Fighting Crime
Gilbert G. Gallegos
President, Fraternal
Order of Police
E. Douglas Hamilton
Chief, Louisville, KY
Survey Findings
Phil E. Keith
Chief, Knoxville, TN
R. Gil Kerlikowske
Attached are results from a poll conducted in July 1996 for Fight Crime:
Commissioner, Buffalo, NY
Talmadge N. Moore
Invest In Kids by the Northeastern University's Center for Criminal Justice
Chief, Ft. Wayne, IN
Policy Research, under the direction of Professor Jack McDevitt.
Charles A. Moose
Chief, Portland, OR
Patrick V. Murphy
The survey sought opinions of 780 police chiefs, including all chiefs from
Former Commiss'r, NYC,
DC. Detroit, Syracuse
cities with populations over 100,000, and a sample of 288 chiefs from cities
Dennis E. Nowicki
of less than 25,000, and 292 chiefs from cities of between 25,000 and
Chief, Charlotte-
Mecklenburg, NC
100,000. The response rate was 70% for a total of 548 surveys returned.
Nicholas Pastore
Chief, New Haven, CT
Matt L. Rodriguez
More than nine out of ten police chiefs (92%) agreed with the
Superintendent, Chicago, IL
statement "America could sharply reduce crime if government invested
Joseph Samuels
Chief, Oakland, CA
more in programs to help children and youth get a good start" by "fully
Darrel W. Stephens
funding Head Start for infants and toddlers, preventing child abuse,
Chief, St. Petersburg, FL
Patrick J. Sullivan, Jr.
providing parenting training for high-risk families, improving schools and
Sheriff, Arapahoe Co., CO
providing after school programs and mentoring." These results were
Donald H. Warshaw
Chief, Miami, FL
strikingly similar regardless of region or city size.
Robert S. Warshaw
Chief, Rochester, NY
Elizabeth M. Watson
Nine out of ten also agreed that "if America does not pay for greater
Chief, Austin, TX
investments in programs to help children and youth now, we will all pay
PROSECUTORS
far more later in crime, welfare, and other costs." Again, these results were
Ronald Earle
nearly identical regardless of city size.
District Atty., Travis Co., TX
Norman S. Early, Jr.
Former D.A., Denver, CO
When chiefs were asked to rank the long-term effectiveness of a number
Jack O'Malley
State's Atty., Cook Co., IL
of possible crime fighting approaches, "increasing investment in programs
Ralph C. Martin, II
that help all children and youth get a good start" was picked as "most
District Atty., Suttolk Co., MA
Elliot L. Richardson
effective" nearly four times as often as either "trying more juveniles as adults"
Former Attorney General
or even "hiring additional police officers."
and Secretary of HEW, of
Defense and of Commerce
Grant Woods
More detailed results available upon request.
Attorney General, AZ
CRIME SURVIVORS
Frances Davis
Fdr., Mothers of All Children
Ellen Halbert
Vice-Chair, Texas Board of
Criminal Justice
Carole Grant Hall
Director, Ginger Ridge
Residents' Initiative
Marc Klaas
Fdr., Klaas Fdn. for Children
Dennis Lees, Ph.D.
Mgr., Mental Health Clinic
Jean Lewis
President, Parents of
Murdered Children
Gordon Rondeau &
Elaine Rondeau
Founders, Action America:
Murder Must End Now
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Suite
B
Washington, DC 20005-3107
(202) 638-0690
Fax
(202)
638-0673
E-mail: [email protected]
A project of the Action Against Crime and
ICO Education Fund
GRAPH 1(A)
Question 1: Please Indicate your level of agreement or disagreement with the following state nent: In the long run, America could sharply
reduce crime if government invested more in programs to help children and youth get a good start (for example, fully funding Head Start for infants
and mentoring). toddlers, preventing child abuse, providing parenting training for high-risk families, improving schools, and providing after-school programs and
Percent of Departments Nationwide Indicating Agreement/Disagreement
92%
Agree or "Strongly Agree"
5%
"Strongly Disagree" or "Disagree"
0%
10%
20%
30%
40%
50%
60%
70%
80%
90%
100%
Table 4(A)
4. Please rank each of the following policies on a scale of 1 to 4, giving a "1" to the policy you think is most effective and a "4" to the policy
you think is the least effective according to their long-term effectiveness in reducing crime and violence. (please use each number only once)
A) Trying more juveniles as adults, and sentencing more juveniles to adult prisons.
B) Increasing investment in programs that help all children and youth get a good start.
C) Hiring of additional police officers.
D) Making parents legally liable when their children commit crimes.
Percent of departments indicating the following policies are the "most effective
Policy of Community
Nationwide and 23001
100,001
or
unde
100,000
Hample
A) Trying more
16
20
10
12
juveniles as adulls,
and sentencing more
juveniles to adult
(n=205)
(n=184)
(n=154)
prisons
B) Increasing
60
51
67
74
investment in
programs that help all
children and youth get
(n=206)
(n=185)
(n=155)
a good start.
C) Hiring of additional
17
20
11
17
police officers.
(n=205)
(n=185)
(n=155)
D) Making parents
26
32
19
18
legally liable when their
children commit
crimes.
(n=204)
(n=186)
(n=154)
11 Some respondents gave more than one policy a rank of "1." Therefore, not all percentages total exactly 100.
Table 2(A)
Question 2: Which of these statements comes closer to your view?
A) If America does not pay for greater investments in programs to help children and youth now, we will all pay far more later in crime, welfare,
and other costs.
B) Greater investment in children and youth may be worthwhile, but will not be valuable as a crime prevention tool.
View
Sizejof Community
Nationwide 25,000 and 25,001 100,001 or
BN
under
100,000
more
%
%
%
1'
%
A) Invest now or pay
90
88
90
94
far more later
B) Perhaps worthwhile
10
12
10
6
but not effective for
crime prevention
n=203
n= 183
n= 154
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Divider Title:
OUR MOST POWERFUL WEAPONS
AGAINST CRIME
Study after study shows that investments in programs to help children and youth get the right start
dramatically reduce crime. The most effective strategy is a continuum of investments spanning from birth
through adolescence. And even when kids begin to get in trouble, it is clear that effective programs can
dramatically reduce the likelihood of recidivism. The following graphs illustrate a few of the leading studies.
Early Childhood Investments Cut Delinquency
The Syracuse University Family Development
Syracuse Family Development
Research Program showed that delinquency was
Research Program
reduced by 91% when families were provided
parent-training home visits, early childhood educa-
Parent-training home visits,
tion, nutritional, health, safety and other human
early childhood education,
services beginning prenatally and continuing until
health, & other services cut
children reached elementary school age. Just ten
delinquency by 90%.
years after the children began elementary school:
Percent Reported Delinquent by
Of those children who had received the ser-
Ages 13-16
vices, only one had been charged with serious
20%
17%
delinquency, and only 6% had even been
reported "ungovernable" to juvenile authorities;
15
Among those children who had not received
the family development and early childhood
10
services, nearly one in five had already been
charged with offenses, including burglary,
5
robbery, assault, and sexual assault. At age
1.5%
15, nearly one in ten were already "chronic
offenders."
0
NO SERVICES
RECEIVED
SERVICES
In short, those denied services as toddlers were ten
times more likely to be delinquent as young teens.
Source: J. Ronald Lally, Peter L. Mangione, Alice S. Honig, and Donna S. Wittner, "More Pride, Less Delinquency: Findings from
the Ten-Year Follow-up Study of the Syracuse University Family Development Research Program", in The Zero to Three Child
Care Anthology, 1984-1992 (Arlington: Zero to Three, 1992), pp. 95-103.
Fight Crime: Invest in Kids
1-800-245-6476
Preschool & Home Visit Programs Cut Crime and Save Money
In the High/Scope Perry Preschool study, three
High/Scope Perry Preschool &
Home Visit Program
and four year olds were randomly divided into
a control group and a group participating in a
quality preschool program with a weekly home
Preschool and weekly home visits
led to an 80% drop in the number
visit aimed at teaching their parents child-
of chronic offenders.
rearing skills. Years later, when these toddlers
were 27 years old, a comparison of arrest
Percent Arrested 5 or More
records for the two groups found that the
Times Through Age 27
preschool and parent training program had:
40%
30
35%
cut arrest rates in half;
20
cut "chronic offender" (number
arrested more than four times) from one
10
in three to one in fourteen, and among
males from nearly one in two to less than
o
one in eight - an 80% reduction. In
NO SERVICES
RECEIVED
SERVICES
short, those denied the services were five
times more likely to have become chronic
offenders.
The High/Scope Perry Preschool program
High/Scope Perry Preschool &
stopped nearly $120,000 per participant (and
Home Visit Program
over $163,000 per male participant) in costs to
crime victims alone, as well as another
Preschool and home visits produced
$30,000 per participant in criminal justice
dramatic cost savings and
system savings, without even counting all its
prevented $148,000 in crime costs
other benefits.
alone for each child served.
Even if one subtracts the interest which could
have been earned on the money if it were used
Cost of Program: $12,000
for investments other than early childhood
education /parent training, the net savings are
extraordinary - over $70,000 per participant
in crime-related costs alone, and a total of
Crime Cost Saved per Participant
$88,000 once welfare, tax, and other savings
TOTAL: $148,000
are included. Every dollar invested in the
program saved $7.16.
Source: Lawrence J. Schweinhart, Helen B. Barnes, and David P. Weikart, Significant Benefits: The High/Scope Perry Preschool
Study Through Age 27, High/Scope Educational Research Foundation, High/Scope Press Michigan, 1993, pp. xvii-xviii, 84-87.
Fight Crime: Invest in Kids
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Abuse and Neglect Dramatically Increase a Child's Chances of
Growing Up to Become a Chronic Offender
In one of the most detailed studies of the
Abuse & Neglect Dramatically Increase
issue to date, the National Institute of
Delinquency and Chronic Criminal Behavior
Justice concluded that being abused or
neglected as a child increased the likeli-
hood of arrest as a juvenile by 59%, as
an adult by 27%, and for a violent crime
by 29%. Those who had been abused or
Abused or Neglected
neglected were nearly twice as likely as
Comparison Group
a demographically matched comparison
group to have been arrested more than
five times.¹
25%
27%
Alarmingly, approximately 3 million
children a year experience physical
abuse or neglect.
20
59%
We don't have to wait for children to be
abused or neglected. We can dramati-
15
17%
cally reduce abuse or neglect-and
17%
crime.
88%
10
9%
5
0
Percent
Percent Arrested Five
Delinquent
or More Times
Source: Michael G. Maxfield and Cathy Spatz Widom; "The Cycle of Violence: Revisited 6
Years Later," Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine Vol. 150, April 1996; Cathy Spatz
Widom, "The Cycle of Violence," National Institute of Justice, October 1992.
'Michael G. Maxfield and Cathy Spatz Widom, "The Cycle of Violence: Revisited 6 Years Later," Pediatric and Adolescent
Medicine, Vol. 150, April, 1996; Cathy Spatz Widom, "The Cycle of Violence," National Institute of Justice, October, 1992.
Fight Crime: Invest in Kids
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Home Visiting Programs Cut Abuse and Neglect
The Prenatal and Early Childhood Nurse
Rochester Medical School
Home Visitation Program, sponsored by the
Nurse Home Visitation Program
University of Rochester Medical School,
provided low-income, first-time teen moth-
ers and their babies home visits by a spe-
Nurses visiting high-risk
cially trained nurse during pregnancy and
for two years after the child's birth. Nurses
mothers at home cut the
provided coaching for parents on child
rates of abuse and neglect
development, child-rearing skills, and
children's health needs, as well as connect-
among participants by 80%.
ing them with other community health and
human service agencies, and informal
support networks of friends and family.
19%
By the time the children turned four, only
Rates of
20%
one in twenty-five receiving the services had
Child Abuse
been abused or neglected-compared to one
in five of the control group. The program
15
& Neglect
had cut the rates of abuse and neglect by
80%. In other words, denying these services
quintupled the risk of abuse and neglect.¹
10
Hawaii's statewide Healthy Start program
screens new mothers at hospitals to identify
4%
at-risk families.² Families have the option to
5
enroll in a comprehensive services program
(about 95% accept) which provides preven-
tive health care and home visits by profes-
0
sionals trained to provide coaching in
parenting skills and child development and
NO SERVICES
RECEIVED
to offer informal counseling on family
SERVICES
problems. Two studies have shown the
program cut abuse and neglect by 50-60%.³
¹Olds, David, et al, "Improving the Life-course Development of Socially Disadvantaged Parents: A Randomized Trial of Nurse
Home Visitation," American Journal of Public Health, 78, 1436-1445, 1988.
²James C. Howell, ed., Guide for Implementing the Comprehensive Strategy for Serious, Violent, and Chronic Juvenile Offenders,
U.S. Department of Justice Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention, May 1995.
³See Center on Child Abuse Prevention Research, National Committee to Prevent Child Abuse. Chicago, IL. "Intensive Home
Visitation: A Randomized Trial, Follow-up and Risk Assessment Study of Hawaii's Healthy Start Program", June 1996,
and National Institute of Justice, "Helping to Prevent Child Abuse-Future Criminal Consequences: Hawaii Healthy Start," October
1995.
Fight Crime: Invest in Kids
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indicated below.
8
Divider Title:
Crime:
Invest
in
FIGHT CRIME: INVEST IN KIDS
President
Fight
Sanford A. Newman
Kids
Associate Directors
Amy R. Dawson
Brendan J. Fitzsimons
Communications Director
John W. Bartlett
SHORT SHRIFT FOR PREVENTION
Over the next few weeks, Congress will face two important test of its commitment to passing meaningful
juvenile crime prevention.
1) After-School Programs: Preventing Crime During the Prime Time of Juvenile Crime.
The President's budget proposed $63 million in funding for after-school programs:
$50 million for 21st Century Community Learning Centers, which provides funds for expanded
learning opportunities for children after-school, weekends and summers.
$13 million for the Community Schools program, which provides money to local schools and
community groups working to prevent crime and violence through after-school and summer
programs for children.
Even the amounts proposed by the administration, which reflect what they felt Congress would realistically
appropriate, barely begin to scratch the surface of the need for after-school programs.
While the House appropriations committee has recommended $50 million for the 21st Century Community
Learning Centers, the Senate appropriations committee has recommended only $1 million in funding.
Neither the Senate nor the House have recommended funding for the Community Schools program.
2) Crime Prevention and the Senate's Juvenile Justice Bill.
S. 10, "Violent and Repeat Juvenile Offender Act of 1997," sponsored by Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-UT), has
been ordered reported out of the Judiciary Committee and will soon be considered by the Senate.
S. 10 authorizes approximately $868 million a year for five years, including $150 million for existing federal
juvenile justice grants and $718 million in new funding. Less than 9% of the new funding would likely go
towards prevention.
Of the $718 million in new funding authorized under the bill:
$500 million is for a block grant of which:
At least $300 million (60%) is required to go for graduated sanctions, juvenile facilities, drug
testing of juvenile delinquents, and for juvenile records.
At most $200 million (40%) is available for: truancy prevention and crime prevention programs,
including curfews, youth organizations and after-school programs; programs requiring juvenile
offenders to complete school or vocational training; programs requiring juvenile offenders to
pay child support; or programs requiring offenders to make restitution to victims.
Experience with Byrne grants and the Local Law Enforcement Block Grants shows that simply
lumping crime prevention in as one of the many allowable uses of a block grant resulted in no more
than 9% of block granted funds being used for prevention. If history is a guide, this means that
roughly 9% of the $200 million portion of this block grant for which prevention is an allowable
use-or just $18 million of the $500 million block grant-would go for the programs that keep
crimes from happening in the first place.
1334 G Street, NW
Suite B
Washington, DC 20005-3107
(202) 638-0690
Fax (202) 638-0673
E-mail: [email protected]
A project of the Action Against Crime and Violence Education Fund
The remaining prevention funding only includes:
$40 million out of a $100 million High Intensity Interstate Gang Activity Areas block grant program
to establish regional taskforces to coordinate investigation, apprehension, and prosecution of
criminal activities of gangs and gang members.
$15 million for Boys and Girls Clubs.
$3 million for a pilot program to replicate successful juvenile crime reduction strategies.
This means that of the $718 million in new funding in S. 10, only $76 million-10%-would likely go for
prevention.
Expected Crime Prevention Amendments to S. 10:
Biden Amendment for preventive after-school programs. Would earmark $100 million of the $500 million
annual block grant to be used for grants for after-school, weekend and summer youth programs, and for
programs for juveniles who have committed juvenile offenses or are identified as at risk of doing so.
Specter Amendment. Would require that 50% of funds allocated under the $500 million annual block grant
be used to provide: literacy and job training, substance-abuse treatment for juvenile offenders, or after-
school and other community-based programs to prevent truancy, school violence and juvenile crime.
House Action on Juvenile Crime Legislation
The House has divided its consideration of juvenile crime legislation into two bills.
H.R. 3, "Juvenile Crime Control Act of 1997," sponsored by Rep. Bill McCollum (R-FL), was approved by
the House on May 8th.:
Provides $1.5 billion over three years for block grants for corrections, prison-building, prosecution,
sanctions, and probation; and
Not only provides no designated funding for prevention, but prevention is not an allowable use of
any of these federal funds.
The bill's supporters say that they are not opposed to prevention funding, but that they do not believe
their bill is the proper legislative vehicle for such funding; that such funds can be provided under H.R.
1818, the Juvenile Justice Reauthorization Bill.
H.R. 1818, "Juvenile Justice Reauthorization Bill," co-sponsored by Rep. Frank Riggs (R-CA) and Rep.
Bobby Scott (D-VA), passed overwhelmingly in the House on July 15th.
Creates a block grant of an unspecified size for prevention and treatment programs, and could be
an important step in the right direction if programs are not just authorized but appropriated. This
block grant would replace specific prevention programs currently authorized in the Juvenile Justice
and Delinquency Prevention Act of 1974.
Clinton Presidential Records
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9
Divider Title:
Major Points about Current and Future Trends in Youth Violence
James Alan Fox, Northeastern University
Recent crime drops can be misleading. They should not full us into a false sense
of complacency about the problem of youth crime. Crime is down, but not out.
Last fall, the FBI reported that for 1985 and 1995, the U.S. homicide rate was
virtually the same; that does not mean, however, that nothing has changed.
There are two crime trends in America--one for the young and one for the mature,
which are moving in opposite directions. From 1985 to 1995, the rate of killing by
adults, ages 25 and over, declined 22 percent. At the same time, the rate of killing
at the hands of teenagers soared, increasing 141 percent from 1985 to 1995.
The healthy drop in murder for 1996, based on the recent FBI preliminary report,
may include a decrease among teenagers; we will know when the Uniform Crime
Reports are released in the fall. Even with the drop in teen violence in 1995 over
1994, and the possible drop again in 1996, the rate of teen violence and murder
remains twice as high as it was a decade ago. We have a long way to go before
we can suggest that the youth crime problem has been arrested.
Future demographics, combined with the breakdown of many socializing forces
and the overall disinvestment in youth, may make the problem of teen violence
even worse in the years ahead. There are now 39 million children under the age
of 10; they will be moving into their teenage years during the next decade. Many
are poor and without adequate supervision.
By the year 2005, there will be a 17% increase in the number of teenagers, with a
larger increase among African-Americans and Latinos. Attorney General Reno
has suggested that "demographics does not have to be destiny." She is
absolutely correct. It is up to us whether this next generation of teens is less
violent than the last.
The movement in Congress toward increased punishment for juvenile offenders
will not offer a solution. Prevention strategies aimed at young children and
intervention approaches for at-risk teens will do the most to avert a future wave of
teen violence. After-school programs, mentoring, and anti-violence strategies
have been shown to impact positively on the attitude and behaviors of youth.
It is far more effective and considerably less expensive to "prehabilitate" the child
by investing in prevention than to attempt to rehabilitate the adult through
incarceration.
Homicide Offending Rate by Age
50
18-24
40
Rate per 100,000
30
14-17
20
10
25+
0
76 77 78 79 80 81 82 83 84 85 86 87 88 89 90 91 92 93 94 95
Year
Source: James Alan Fox, Northeastem University
James Alan Fox, Ph.D.
Dr. James Alan Fox is Dean and Professor of the College of Criminal Justice at Northeastern
University in Boston. He has published twelve books on violence in America, as well as dozens
of journal and magazine articles and newspaper columns, primarily in the areas of multiple
murder, juvenile crime, workplace violence, and capital punishment.
Fox often gives lectures and expert testimony, including four appearances before the United
States Congress, a White House meeting with President Clinton and Vice President Gore on
youth violence, and a private briefing to Attorney General Reno on trends in juvenile violence.
Clinton Presidential Records
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marker by the William J. Clinton Presidential Library Staff.
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digitization capabilities, we are sometimes unable to adequately
scan such dividers. The title from the original document is
indicated below.
10
Divider Title:
J
The -Jallas Horning Netus
Sunday, July 20, 1997
JUVENILE
CRIME
that a child will become a chronic offender as an
adult. The good news: Other studies show that volun-
tary. in-home parenting coaching for 3t-risk parents
who want help can cut kids' risk of abuse and neglect
Prevention works
by up to 80 percent.
Even when kids have started to get in trouble. it
isn't too late. Studies in Utah and South Carolina show
better than
that family-based counseling and other services can
cut young offenders' chances of recidivism in half
and cut in half the chances that their younger siblings
will become Ninquent
detention
The House juvenile crime bill not only forbids
spending on effective programs like those but also
The House of Representatives
would spread the crime epidemic by put .1g more
recently passed a bill that would
juvenile offenders - including pre-teen runaways and
spend $1.5 billion pretending to
truants who may be victims of neglect - in adult facil-
be tough on juvenile crime -
ities where they can quickly learn the "values" and
and rejected the most powerful
skills of far more serious criminals
weapons in our anti-crime arse-
If you don't believe the studies. ask those on the
nal, the only wespons that can
front lines of the war on crime In 3 poll by Northeast-
prevent crime before it claims its
crn University criminologist Jack McDevitt. police
ELLEN
victims.
chiefs nationwide picked increasing investments in
HALBERT
Eleven years ago, I was
kids 35 the "most effective" crime prevention policy
attacked by an intruder in my
nearly & to 1 over "trying more juveniles as adults' or
home. I was raped and stabbed in the chest and neck;
even "hiring additional police officers."
my skull was fractured by one hammer blow after
What's more. investments in programs for kids will
another. and a knife was hammered into my head.
save taxpayers millions of dollars. The Michigan study
Like other crime survivors across the country. I have
cited above showed that ITS program of quality pre-
paid too big a price to be silent when our leaders pre-
school and parental coaching saved $150.000 per par-
tend that building more prisons is a substitute for pre-
venuon.
ticipant in crime costs alone - plus additional savings
Brutal criminals like the one who attacked me need
on reduced social services. welfare and other COSTS.
to be locked up. But more prisons and police can't
Vanderbilt University economist Mark Cohen esti-
undo the agony I went through. When you look at
mates that every at-risk child we turn away from a life
what works to prevent crime, you learn that our first
of crime saves taxpayers at least $1.5 million. So the
line of defense is to invest in programs for infants,
real question is: "Can we afford to squander billions of
coaching for at-risk parents. Head Start for toddlers.
tax dollars by forgoing investments that save money,
school enrichment and after school programs as kids
lives and incalculable suffering?"
ger older and. finally. children's health care to pre-
What would it be worth to you to feel safe again?
vent or treat learning impairments and mental health
What happened to me didn't have to happen. The
problems before people get hurt.
teenager who so viciously attacked me wasn't born to
Wishful thinking? Hardly Programs like those
rape and murder. There were dozens of places along
have proved time and again that the best way to
the way where we as a nation should have stepped in
reduce crime is to help kids get the right start in life.
to ger him on 3 track to being a contributing citizen.
For example:
That is why I have joined with scores of crime survi.
In studies in Ypsilanti, Mich., and Syracuse. N.Y.,
vors, police and prosecutors from across the nation to
at-risk toddlers who were denied quality early child-
launch the Fight Crime: Invest in Kids campaign.
hood programs like Head Start were 10 times as likely
Together. we are calling on politicians to skip the
to be delinquent as teenagers and five times as likely
sound bites and boost the investments in children that
to be chronic offenders as adults.
are our most powerful weapons against crime.
The Quantum Opportunities Program of counsel-
No punishment can undo 3 crime. The Senate still
ing. academic support. community service and finan-
has the chance to turn the House's folly into good pol-
cial incentives cut at-risk high schoolers' chances of
icy by investing now in the proven programs that help
being arrested in half.
kids get the right start. Anything less will be too little.
Kids without access TO quality mentoring pro-
too late for too many Americans.
grams like Big Brothers/Big Sisters were two to three
times as likely to start using drugs by age 16. according
Ellen Halbert of Austin was vice chairman of the
to a Public. Private Ventures study
Texas Board of Criminal Justice and is C tounding advi-
Being abused or deglected doubles the likelihood
sorv heard member of Fight Crime Invest: Kids.
The Boston Blobe
FRIDAY. NOVEMBER 1, 1996
Studies prove it: The best way to fight crime
is to invest in children
criminals and seizing drugs and guns from the street.
ELLIOT L. RICHARDSON
But when asked which strategies would have the great-
est long-term impact in reducing crime, police chiefs
and R. GIL KERLIKOWSKE
picked increasing investments in children by a 3-to-1
margin over trying more juveniles as adults or even hir-
II across America, candidates for federal,
ing more police officers.
A
state and local office are talking about crime.
Can we afford to make these investments? Economist
But too few are focusing on our most effective
Steve Barnett estimates that the High/Scope preschool
weapons in the battle against crime - the
program saved nearly $150,000 in crime costs alone per
proven investments that help children get the right start
participant. Professor Mark Cohen of Vanderbilt Uni-
in life so they become contributing citizens instead of
versity estimates that preventing one high-risk youth
criminals.
from becoming a criminal saves at least $1.5 million. Yet
Incarcerating dangerous criminals is a vital defense.
these investments are so underfunded that they can
But few battles are won with defensive tactics alone,
reach only tiny fractions of those who need them.
Those of us who have been on the front lines as police,
That is why we recently joined with many other po-
prosecutors and crime survivors know America must
lice leaders, prosecutors and crime survivors in launch-
fight crime not just from the back but by investing in
ing the "Fight Crime: Invest in Kids Campaign" and in
Head Start and parenting education, "keep up" pro-
challenging candidates to tell the American people what
grams to prevent overburdened schools and vulnerable
they will do to increase the front-end investments proven
students from falling behind, after-school, mentoring and
to dramatically reduce crime.
job training programs and strategies to address delin-
Back-end, punishment-only approaches can't undo
quency and help troubled children get back on track.
the agony crime leaves behind. As Marc Klaas explained.
Do these investments really reduce crime? Absolute-
after his 12-year-old daughter's murderer was sentenced
ly. For example:
to death: "That won't bring Polly back. When politicians
The High/Scope Foundation's Perry Preschool
pretend that punishing criminals after people are hurt is
study in Ypsilanti. Mich., showed that when at risk 3-
a substitute for preventing crimes, the first people who
and 4-year-olds were randomly assigned to receive child
get sentenced are crime victims and their families - sen-
care similar to a Head Start program, together with a
tenced to shattered lives and broken hearts."
weekly home visit providing coaching for parents, the
Ignoring prevention investments leaves us stuck on a
risk these children would grow up to become chronic
treadmill. running faster and faster to put people in jail
lawbreakers was cut by a startling 80 percent.
while kids are turned into criminals faster than we can
The Syracuse University Family Development
lock them up. To make America safe, we need to be as
Study showed that providing quality early-childhood
willing to guarantee our kids space in Head Start or an
programs to families until children reached age 5 re-
after-school or job training program as we are to guaran-
duces the children's risk of delinquency 10 years later by
tee room and board in a prison cell for a criminal.
90 percent.
We'll win the war on crime when we're ready to in-
The Quantum Opportunities Program, conducted in
vest time and dollars in our most vulnerable youths be-
Philadelphia, San Antonio, Milwaukee, Oklahoma City
fore they become our most wanted adults.
and Saginaw, has shown that a high school program of
It's time Republicans and Democrats joined in a com-
counseling, academic and life-skills support, community
mitment to the investments in children. These programs
service and other incentives cut the risk of arrest during
are our strongest weapons in the fight against crime.
high school years by 50 percent.
Each of us should join Jean Lewis, president of the Na-
Even when youths begin to get into trouble, we don't
tional Organization of Parents of Murdered Children, in
have to throw in the towel. The Salt Lake County Juve-
taking this pledge: "When I cast my vote. I'll be asking
nile Court, for example, found that when it randomly
which candidates are ready to fight crime not only from
assigned some delinquent children and their families to
the back end after someone has been hurt, but also from
participate in family systems counseling, their risk, as
the front end by investing in today's children - because
well as their siblings' risk, of committing an offense was
anything else is to little, too late."
cut in half.
No wonder that in a recent survey by criminologist
Elliot L Richardson served as US attorney general sec-
Jack McDevitt. nine out of 10 police chiefs said, "Amer-
retary of commerce, secretary of defense and secretary of
ica could sharply reduce crime if government invested
health. education and welfare. Buffalo Police Commis-
more" in these programs. Police chiefs know their first
sioner R. Gil Kerlikowske is president of the Police Ex-
mission is responding to the public's cails by arresting
ecutive Research Forum
BOSTON
HERALI
BOSTON HERALD
BOSTON. MA
DAILY
317.361
MONDAY
NOV 4 1996
BURRELLE'S
25
QC
X.EAC
A...A
WILLIAM BRATTON and SANFORD NEWMAN
Fighting crime before it starts
2838
P
olice, prosecutors and crime
ward off crime and violence.
When being abused as a child
survivors from across Amer-
The good news is that America's
nearly doubles the chances of
ica recently issued an unusu-
crime-fighting arsenal includes en-
growing up to be a violent crimi-
al challenge to federal, state and
ormously powerful "right-start"
nal, it's common sense to protect
local candidates. Tell the American
programs. The bad news: We're
abused children and to provide the
people. we urged, what you will do
fighting crime with one hand tied
parenting-coaching programs that
to increase the investments in kids
behind our backs because these
have been shown to cut child
that have been proven to dramati-
programs, like so many preven-
abuse by 50-80 percent.
cally reduce crime - like Head
tion-oriented initiatives, are so
Few of those who wind up in
Start, good schools, after-school
starved for funding that they
our prisons were born to become
programs. parenting education,
reach only a tiny fraction of the
criminals. Their behavior is
counseling for at-risk kids and
children who need them. That's
learned behavior. Offering kids the
child abuse prevention.
why so many police, prosecutors
experience and mentoring they
Have we suddenly gone soft on
and crime survivors have joined
need to become good citizens is
crime? Hardly. We know there is
together to launch a Fight Crime:
just common sense - and self-de-
no substitute for locking up dan-
Invest In Kids offensive. Our mes-
fense. Indeed, it is a basic tenet of
gerous criminals, and that efficient
sage is simple: If we want a two-
the community policing philosophy
policing matters. Between 1994
fisted attack on crime, we need to
that we have embraced in New
and 1996. tough, smart policing
give kids a helping hand.
York City.
played a key role in cutting New
When the High/Scope Founda-
That's why, in a recent survey
York City's violent crime rate by
tion's research tells us that kids
conducted by Northeastern Uni-
36 percent. But policy-makers
denied its early childhood program
versity criminologist Jack McDe-
should not draw the wrong lesson
were five times as likely to become
vitt, nine out of 10 police chiefs
from that experience. Prevention
multipe offenders, and Syracuse
agreed that "America could sharp-
of crime is the ultimate goal - not
University's research tell us those
ly reduce crime if government in-
just officially responding to it.
denied its services were 10 times
vested more" in programs for kids.
Those of us who have been on
as likely to engage in delinquency,
Skimping on investments in kids
the front lines know that, in the
it's common sense to provide early
is penny-wise and pound-foolish.
long run. winning the war on
childhood programs.
crime also will require cutting the
When the peak hours for juven-
William Bratton was New
enemy's key supply line: its ability
ile crime are between school dis-
York City police commissioner
to turn kids into criminals. Each
missal and 6 p.m., and when stu-
from January 1994 to April 1996,
day gangs and drug dealers assi-
dies of programs like Big
Boston police commissioner in
dously recruit our children for
Brothers/Big Sisters mentoring
1993 and is currently vice chair-
their army. To fight back, we must
shows they cut by 30-50 percent
man of First Security Services
utilize other powerful crime fight-
the risk of kids using drugs or en-
Corporation.
ing weapons - the proven "right-
gaging in violence, it's common
Sanford Newman is an attor-
start" programs and strategies
sense to provide after-school,
ney who has been a victim of
that give kids the armor of values.
weekend and summer tutoring,
crime and is president of Fight
skills, and positive experiences to
mentoring and recreation.
Crime: Invest in Kids.
The Charlotte Observer
METRO EDITION
C
MONDAY, OCTOBER 28, 1996
The economics of crime: Pay now or pay later
quality Head Start-type program
never win the war on crime until it
sharply reduce crime if govern-
Prosecutors know America will never win the war on crime
when they were 3 to 4 years old,
invests more in getting kids the
ment invested more in programs
intil it invests more in getting kids the right start.
with weekly at-home coaching for
right start. We can pay now or pay
for kids," and warned that if we do
their parents. A look at arrest
later.
not increase those investments
records 23 years after the toddlers
Police chiefs agree. Chief Den-
now, "we will pay far more later in
finished the program found that
nis Nowicki says, "Shortchanging
crime, welfare and other costs."
By PETER GILCHRIST
fighters have joined together to
those who had not received the
prevention efforts shortchanges
Despite all the evidence, Con-
Special to The Observer
launch a nonpartisan campaign
services were five times as likely to
public safety. We need to be as
gress has so shortchanged Head
rime is a major issue in fed-
called Fight Crime: Invest In Kids
C
have more than four arrests.
ready to provide tutoring or an
Start that it can serve only a third
eral, state and local elections
and to write to all the nation's
Syracuse University's Family
after-school program for innocent
of our most vulnerable 3 and 4 year
across the country.
candidates.
Development Research Program
kids as we are to guarantee crimi-
olds. Other programs serve even
Most candidates spare no effort
Of course, they are determined
shows a 90 percent cut in delin-
nals room and board in a jail cell."
smaller fractions of the kids who
o prove they are the "toughest in
to lock up dangerous criminals.
quency resulting from early child-
Raleigh Police Chief Mitchell
need them. We can be proud of
their district." But
But here's their challenge to candi-
hood programs.
Brown says that when politicians
North Carolina's Smart Start com-
few bother to tell
dates: What will you do to increase
The Quantum Opportunities
ignore these right-start invest-
munity-based initiatives for kids,
us what they will
the front-end investments proven
Program showed that involving
ments, "they are throwing away
but far more remains to be done.
do to strengthen
to dramatically reduce crime -
vulnerable high school kids in
the weapons that could help us get
When you cast your votes, ask
our most powerful
like parenting education, Head
community service and providing
the upper hand against crime."
which candidates are ready to fight
weapons against
Start, child abuse prevention, after-
them with counseling and with
Greensboro Chief Sylvester
crime from the front end by invest
crime
-
the
school programs, and programs to
academic and other support cut in
Daughtry says, "We have to keep
ing in today's children rather than
proven invest-
keep kids from falling behind in
half the number who wound up
putting dangerous criminals be-
only from the back end after some-
ments that help
school?
arrested.
hind bars. But we have to fight just
one has been hurt. If voters want to
kids get the right
What makes us think programs
Last year, our office dealt with
Gilchrist
as hard to keep kids from becom-
know who is really going to do
start in life so they
like these prevent cri e? First-
9,000 felonies and sent a lot of
ing criminals in the first place, and
something about crime, that is a
grow up to be contributing citizens
hand, hard-nosed, real-world expe-
people to prison - enough to tell
that means getting all kids the
key question to ask.
nstead of criminals.
rience - and scientific evidence
me that street criminals and drug
early childhood care, the good
This month, police, prosecutors
like this:
dealers are recruiting new troops
schools, and the youth programs
Peter Gilchrist is Mecklenburg
and crime survivors from around
High/Scope's Perry Preschool
for their army about as fast as we
they need."
County district attorney. Write him
the country, fed up with political
randomly selected half of a group
can get them locked up.
In a recent poll, 9 out of 10 police
c/o The Observer, P.O. Box 30308,
slogans, said "Enough!" The crime
of vulnerable kids to receive a high
Prosecutors know America will
chiefs agreed that "America could
Charlotte, NC 28230-0308.
ene
Sa
D
egu
Union Tribune
OPINION
FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 1, 1996
Fighting crime by investing in kids
By Marc Klaas
Twenty-three years later, its researchers
cluding Oakland County Police Chief Joe
y daughter Polly has made a lot of
found that those kids denied the Head
M
Samuels and Los Angeles County Sheriff
headlines in this campaign season.
Start/parenting education program were
Sherman Block, joined recently in launch-
While I cannot support those who
five times as likely to have become chron-
ing an important new anti-crime offensive
use her tragic death to distort an oppo-
ic lawbreakers.
called Fight Crime: Invest in Kids Cam-
nent's record, I do very much want Polly's
Other studies show that help for older
paign.
death to help save other lives, and I know
kids can also significantly improve their
Polly would have felt that was the best
- and our - chances. For example,
Time, energy and tax dollars
memorial we could give her. In fact, the
when the Quantum Opportunities Pro-
Our message is simple: We'll win the
last words she said as she was led out of
gram had high school kids participate in
war on crime when we're ready to invest
her bedroom at knifepoint were a plea that
community service and gave them coun-
our time, energy and our tax dollars in
her abductor not hurt anyone else.
seling, academic help and financial incen-
America's most vulnerable children so
But if Polly's death is to help protect
tives, it cut the risk of arrest by 50 per-
that they never become America's most
others, we need to go beyond talking
cent.
wanted adults. Anything else is too little
about the death penalty, or even about
If you don't trust the studies, ask Amer-
too late.
prison sentences and focus on the most
ica's police. In a recent survey by crimi-
That's why, when I realized that Cali-
critical steps our communities and our na-
nologist Jack McDevitt, nine out of 10 po-
fornia's poorly written version of the
tion can take to protect all of our children.
lice chiefs said "America could sharply
three-strikes law was locking up people
reduce crime" if government invested
Giving them the right start
who weren't dangerous, and was taking
more in these Right Start programs.
resources away from badly needed invest-
As hard as I fought to see that Polly's
Asked which strategies would have the
ments in kids that could stop far more
killer received the death sentence he de-
greatest long-term impact in reducing
crime, I began to speak out against it.
serves, that won't bring Polly back. But
crime, police chiefs picked increasing in-
It is why I'll vote for Proposition 217,
we can save thousands of children and
vestments in kids by a 3-1 margin over
which would restore a small portion of the
adults if we invest now in the proven pro-
trying more juveniles as adults or even
funds that are needed if we are to provide
grams that help kids get the right start
hiring more police officers.
kids with adequate schools and social ser-
and keep them from becoming criminals in
Nine out of ten warned that if we don't
vices, and Proposition 210, to raise the
the first place.
boost these investments, "we will all pay
minimum wage so that young people will
The plain truth is that the most power-
far more later in crime, welfare and other
know that hard work pays, and that they
ful weapons we have against crime are
costs."
don't need to turn to crime to make ends
programs like Head Start, parenting edu-
High Scope's Perry Preschool, for ex-
meet.
cation, mentoring, good schools and after-
ample, saved $148,000 in crime costs
It's also the reason that Fight Crime:
school programs, and job training - pro-
alone for every child served. Yet these
Invest in Kids has called on candidates to
grams that can dramatically reduce crime
right-start investments are so under-fund-
tell the voters what it will do to fight crime
by helping kids become productive citi-
ed that they can't begin to serve more
before anyone gets hurt, by boosting in-
zens instead of brutal criminals. For exam-
than a small portion of the kids who need
vestment programs for kids.
ple:
them.
High/Scope Educational Research
Don't get me wrong. No one feels more
If voters want to know who's really go-
Foundation's Perry Preschool study com-
strongly than I that we need to get dan-
ing to do something about crime, they
bined a high-quality Head Start-style pro-
gerous criminals off the streets and be-
need to ask which candidates are ready
gram for 3- and 4-year-olds with weekly
hind bars.
not just to punish criminals after people
home visits to coach their parents. Due to
But if we don't invest in programs that
have been hurt, but also to make the in-
lack of funding, High Scope randomly
help children become caring citizens in-
vestments in kids that could have stopped
chose half the children who applied.
stead of brutal criminals, we will all pay an
so many of those crimes from happening
unfathomable cost in broken lives and bro-
in the first place.
KLAAS founded the Klaas Foundation for
ken hearts.
Candidates who ignore that question
Children after his 12-year-old daughter, Polly,
That's why police, prosecutors and
are ignoring our most effective weapons
was abducted and murdered.
crime survivors from all over America, in-
against crime.
THE ATLANTA CONSTITUTION
The Atlanta Journal
Corers Disie Like the Deir
TODAY'S NEWS
Fighting crime upfront
By Gordon and Elaine Rondeau
And in Savannah, the Uhuru pro-
dren as the most effective long-
gram, providing family services,
term crime-fighting strategy when
T
hursday marked the second
mentoring and education for high-
compared with such options as try-
grim anniversary of the mur-
risk 11- to 13-year-olds, has signifi-
ing more juveniles as adults or
der of our daughter Renee, a
cantly decreased delinquency.
hiring more police.
talented, caring woman whose life
If children begin to have emo-
We must challenge our political
was cut short at 30. As we struggle
tional problems or get into trouble,
leaders to act now. We must call on
still to move on with our lives, we
counseling, drug treatment and
politicians to skip the sound bites
hear candidates in federal, state and
other programs can save them from
and tell voters what they'll do to
local elections bluster about how
becoming hardened criminals.
boost the investments in children
tough they'll be on criminals. But
Crime prevention investments
that are our most powerful weapons
most candidates are silent about our
even save tax dollars: Steve Bar-
against crime.
most powerful weapons in the battle
nett, an economist at Rutgers Uni-
We need to vote for candidates
against crime: the proven programs
versity, estimates that the Ypsilanti
who are ready to fight crime not
that help kids get the right start so
preschool project saves an average
only from the back end - after
they become responsible, compas-
$150,000 per child in subsequent
someone has been hurt - but also
sionate adults instead of criminals.
crime costs alone. Mark Cohen, a
from the front end, by investing in
Politicians who focus only on pun-
professor at Vanderbilt University,
today's children. Anything else is
ishments are cheating Americans
estimates that saving one high-risk
too little, too late.
out of the solutions that could have
child from a life of crime saves at
prevented Renee's death and so
least $1.5 million.
Gordon and Elaine Rondeau, who live
many others.
If ever our moral obligations
in Marietta, are founders of Action
It's no secret what prevents
coincided with our self-interest,
America: Murder Must End Now
crime: programs such as Head
this is it.
(AAMMEN) and serve on the national
Start, parenting education, good
All of us should volunteer to help
advisory committee of Fight Crime:
schools, after-school programs and
in our communities. But that can't
Invest in Kids.
job training. For example:
relieve government of its responsi-
A study in Ypsilanti, Mich.,
bility to do all it can to fight crime
shows that toddlers randomly
by playing an appropriate role to
assigned to participate in a pre-
ensure that children get the help
school program and receive weekly
they need to become responsible
home visits were 80 percent less
citizens.
likely than a control group to
Ask America's police chiefs. In a
become chronic law-breakers as
recent poll by Northeastern Univer-
adults.
sity, nine out of 10 chiefs agreed
The Quantum Opportunities Pro-
that "America could sharply reduce
gram, an after-school dropout pre-
crime if we invested more in pro-
vention program in five cities, has
grams to help children and youth
found that counseling, academic
get a good start." By a 3-1 ratio,
and life-skills support, community
police chiefs picked increasing
service and financial incentives
investments in programs for chil-
reduce the risk of arrest during
high school years by 50 percent.
NATIONAL ADVISORY
President
COMMITTEE
FIGHT
INVEST
Sanford A. Newman
Associate Directors
POLICE
CRIME
IN
KIDS
Amy R. Dawson
Philip Arreola
Brendan J. Fitzsimons
Chief, Tacoma, WA
Sherman Block
Media Director
Sheriff, LA County, CA
William Bratton
John W. Bartlett
Fmr. Commiss'r., NYC
Sam A. Cabral
President, Int'l Union of
NATIONAL CRIME AND
Police Ass'ns, AFL-CIO
Dean M. Esserman
September 5, 1997
VIOLENCE PREVENTION
Chief, Metro North, NY
RESOURCE COUNCIL
Gilbert G. Gallegos
President, Fraternal
Barbara T. Bowman, M.A.
Order of Police
Ms. Jennifer Klein
President, Erickson Institute of
E. Douglas Hamilton
Chief, Louisville, KY
Senior Policy Analyst
Advanced Study in Child
Development
Phil E. Keith
Domestic Policy Council
John A. Calhoun, M.P.A.
Chief, Knoxville, TN
The White House, West Wing, 2nd floor
Executive Director, National
R. Gil Kerlikowske
Crime Prevention Council
Commissioner, Buffalo, NY
Washington, D.C. 20502
Talmadge N. Moore
Donald J. Cohen, M.D.
Chief, Ft. Wayne, IN
Director, Yale Child Study
Charles A. Moose
Center
Dear Jennifer,
Chief, Portland, OR
Sanford Dornbusch, Ph.D.
Patrick V. Murphy
Professor Emeritus, Stanford;
Former Commiss'r, NYC,
I'm looking forward to meeting your and brainstorming together
Advisory Board Chair, Stanford
DC, Detroit, Syracuse
Center on Adolescence
Dennis E. Nowicki
about the upcoming conference.
Craig W. Floyd
Chief, Charlotte-
Chair, National Law Enforce-
Mecklenburg, NC
ment Officers Memorial Fund
Matt L. Rodriguez
As promised, I've enclosed a packet being distributed this morning
James A. Fox, Ph.D.
Superintendent, Chicago,
IL at the Early Childhood Strike Force Roundtable. Among other things, it
Dean, College of Criminal
Joseph Samuels
includes:
Justice, Northeastern University
Chief, Oakland, CA
John W. Gardner, Ph.D.
Darrel W. Stephens
Former US Secretary of Health,
Fmr. Chief, St. Petersburg, FL
Patrick J. Sullivan, Jr.
a) some of our op eds and a few of the other press clips on our
Education, and Welfare:
Consulting Professor, Stanford
Sheriff, Arapahoe Co., CO
recent media events.
Richard Gerber, M.D.
Donald H. Warshaw
Associate Clinical Professor of
Chief, Miami, FL
Robert S. Warshaw
b) graphs and text summarizing some of the evidence on the crime
Psychiatry, GWU Med. School
Alice S. Honig, Ph.D.
Chief, Rochester, NY
Elizabeth M. Watson
prevention impact of early childhood programs. (We actually may be
Professor Emerita, Child
Former Chief, Austin, TX
issuing a more detailed report on this subject before the end of October.)
Development, Syracuse Univ.
Thomas C. Joe, M.A.
PROSECUTORS
Director, Center for the
c) The statement Winston-Salem Police Chief George Sweat
Study of Social Policy
Ronald Earle
J. Ronald Lally, Ed.D.
District Atty., Travis Co., TX
delivered this morning at the roundtable.
Dir., Ctr. for Child and Family
Norman S. Early, Jr.
Studies, Far West Laboratory
Former D.A., Denver, CO
Ralph C. Martin, II
Looking forward to seeing you on the 15th at 11:00 at your office.
Steven Marans, Ph.D.
Director, Program on Child
District Atty., Suffolk Co., MA
Development-Community
Jack O'Malley
Warmly
Policing, Yale Child Study Ctr.
Fmr. State's Atty., Cook Co., IL
Ray Marshall, Ph.D.
Elliot L. Richardson
Former US Secretary of Labor;
Former US Attorney General
Chair in Economics and Public
and Secretary of HEW, of
Affairs, Univ. of Texas Austin
Defense and of Commerce
Sandy Newman
Jack McDevitt, Ph.D.
Grant Woods
Professor, College of Criminal
Attorney General, AZ
Justice, Northeastern Univ.;
Co-Director, Center for Criminal
CRIME SURVIVORS
Justice Policy Research
Lisbeth B. Schorr
Frances Davis
Lecturer in Social Medicine,
Fdr., Mothers of All Children
Harvard University
Ellen Halbert
David P. Weikart, Ph.D.
Editor, National Crime
President, High/Scope
Victims Report
Educational Research Fdn.
Carole Grant Hall
Bernice Weissbourd
Director, Ginger Ridge
Residents' Initiative
President, Family Resource
Marc Klaas
Council
Fdr., Klaas Fdn. for Children
Richard Weissbourd, Ph.D.
Dennis Lees, Ph.D.
Professor, Kennedy School of
Mgr., Mental Health Clinic
Government, Harvard
Jean Lewis
Chuck Wexler, Ph.D.
President, Parents of
Executive Director, Police
Murdered Children
Executive Research Forum
Gordon Rondeau &
Edward Zigler, Ph.D.
Elaine Rondeau
Director, Bush Center in Child
Founders, Action America:
Development and Social Policy,
Murder Must End Now
Yale University
1334 G Street, NW
Suite B
Washington, DC 20005-3107
(202) 638-0690
Fax (202) 638-0673
E-mail: [email protected]
A project of the Action Against Crime and Violence Education Fund
This story ran in scores of news papers accross the country on
may 26, 1997. A circulation of over 100,000.
44'6
North Carolina can cut crime
by investing in its children
BY MITCHELL BROWN
family development study, which
AND SYLVESTER DAUGHTRY
looked at quality child care and
INVEST IN KIDS
maternal outreach for children
until the age of 5, demonstrated
You say you've had enough of
that, 10 years later, the risk of
violence and fear in our com-
these children becoming delin-
munities?
quents was reduced by 90 per-
Well, we have news for you: We
cent.
can dramatically reduce crime.
The National Institute of Jus-
But not if we focus only on
tice found that children who are
punishing crime on the "back
abused or neglected are twice as
end," after people have been
hurt. That's fighting with one
likely to become chronic law-
hand tied behind our backs.
breakers when they become
We are as determined as ever
adults. The good news is that
to put dangerous criminals be-
voluntary maternal outreach pro-
hind bars. But those of us who
grams are proven to cut the risk
have been on the front lines know
of abuse and neglect by 50-75
that winning the war on crime
percent.
will require cutting the enemy's
These programs save lives and
key supply line: the ability to turn
money. The Perry Preschool pro-
kids into criminals.
ject found it had saved an aver-
Our most powerful anti-crime
age of $150,000 per participant in
weapons are the programs that
crime cost savings alone, and
help kids get the right start so
maternal outreach programs
that they'll grow up to be respon-
have been shown to pay for
sible adults. North Carolina has
themselves in reduced welfare
the opportunity now to
and child protective services cost
strengthen one of its most effec-
within four years - with tens of
tive anti-crime measures ever:
thousands of dollars in crime
the Maternal Outreach Worker
savings following year after year.
program.
Our legislature's bipartisan
The Maternal Outreach Worker
Child Fatality Task Force
program, or MOW, offers at-risk
proposed expanding the Maternal
mothers - usually unmarried
Outreach Worker program by
teens - the advice of a parenting
$3.2 million to offer services to
coach from the community to
3,000 more working mothers of
help them learn tö raise healthy
kids under 3. That recommen-
children with the values and
dation is running into trouble.
skills to become responsible
Maternal outreach gives at-risk
adults.
mothers who request it the
Across the country, programs
chance to learn the parenting
that offer quality child care,
skills that others may take for
NC-D450
DAILY NEWSPAPER
provide coaching for at-risk new
granted. And it's about protecting
parents who want help, and pre-
SALISBURY POST
us and our loved ones, because
vent abuse and neglect have
when we refuse to provide this
Salisbury, NC
dramatically cut crime.
coaching, we all pay the price.
In Ypsilanti, Michigan, the
Circ- (E) 25,414 (S) 26,408
High-Scope Foundation's Perry
Preschool project showed that
Raleigh Police Chief Mitchell
toddlers randomly assigned to
Brownis co-chair of Fight Crime:
MAY 26, 1997
participate in a preschool pro-
Invest In Kids North Carolina.
gram and receive weekly ma-
Greensboro Police Chief Sylvester
ternal outreach home visits were
Daughtry Jr. is a member of their
80 percent less likely than a
group's advisory committee anda
control group to become chronic
past president of the Inter-
Bacon's
lawbreakers as adults.
national Association of Chiefs of
The Syracuse University
Police.
The Dallas Morning News
Sunday, July 20, 1997
JUVENILE
CRIME
that a child will become a chronic offender as an
adult. The good news: Other studies show that volun-
tary. i-home parenting coaching for 3t-risk parents
who want help can cut kids' risk of abuse and neglect
by up to 80 percent
Prevention works
Even when kids have started to get in trouble. it
isn't too late. Studies in Utah and South Carolina show
that family-based counseling and other services can
better than
cut young offenders chances of recidivism in half
and cut in half the chances that their younger siblings
will become olinquent.
detention
The House's juvenile crime bill not only forbids
spending on effective programs like those but also
The House of Representatives
would spread the crime epidemic by putting more
recently passed a bill that would
juvenile offenders - including pre-teen runaways and
spend $1.5 billion pretending to
truants who may be victims of neglect - in adult facil-
be tough on juvenile crime -
ities where they can quickly learn the "values" and
and rejected the most powerful
skills of far more serious criminals
weapons in our anti-crime arse-
If you don't believe the studies. ask those on the
front lines of the war on crime. In 3 poll by Northeast-
nal, the only weapons that can
prevent crime before it claims its
crn University criminologist Jack McDevitt. police
ELLEN
victims.
chiefs nationwide picked increasing investments in
HALBERT
kids 35 the "most effective" crime prevention policy
Eleven years ago, I was
attacked by an intruder in my
nearly 4 to 1 over "trying more juveniles as adults or
home. I was raped and stabbed in the chest and neck;
even "hiring additional police officers."
my skull was fractured by one hammer blow after
What's more. investments in programs for kids will
another. and a knife was hammered into my head.
save taxpayers millions of dollars The Michigan study
cited above showed that its program of quality pre-
Like other crime survivors across the country. I have
school and parental coaching saved $150.000 per par-
paid too big a price to be silent when our leaders pre-
tend that building more prisons is a substitute for pre-
ticipant in crime costs alone - plus additional savings
vention.
on reduced social services. welfare and other COSTS.
Brutal criminals like the one who attacked me need
Vanderbilt University economist Mark Cohen esti-
to be locked up. But more prisons and police can't
undo the agony I went through. When you look at
mates that every at-risk child we turn away from a life
what works to prevent crime, you learn that our first
of crime saves taxpayers at least $1.5 million. So the
line of defense is to invest in programs for infants.
real question is: "Can we afford to squander billions of
coaching for at-risk parents. Head Start for toddlers.
tax dollars by forgoing investments that save money,
school enrichment and after school programs as kids
lives and incalculable suffering?"
What would it be worth to you to feel safe again?
ger older and. finally. children's health care to pre-
vent or treat learning impairments and mental health
What happened to me didn't have to happen. The
problems before people get hurt.
teenager who so viciously attacked me wasn't born to
Wishful thinking? Hardly. Programs like those
rape and murder. There were dozens of places along
have proved time and again that the best way to
the way where we as a nation should have stepped in
reduce crime is to help kids get the right start in life.
to ger him on 3 track to being a contributing citizen.
For example:
That is why I have joined with scores of crime survi-
In studies in Ypsilanti, Mich., and Syracuse. N.Y.,
vors, police and prosecutors from across the nation to
at-risk toddlers who were denied quality early child-
launch the Fight Crime: Invest in Kids campaign.
hood programs like Head Start were 10 times as likely
Together. we are calling on politicians to skip the
sound bites and boost the investments in children that
to be delinquent as teenagers and five times as likely
to be chronic offenders as adults.
are our most powerful weapons against crime.
The Quantum Opportunities Program of counsel-
No punishment can undo a crime. The Senate still
has the chance to turn the House's folly into good pol-
ing. academic support. community service and finan-
cial incentives cut at-risk high schoolers' chances of
icy by investing now in the proven programs that help
being arrested in half.
kids get the right start. Anything less will be too little,
Kids without access TO quality mentoring pro-
too late for too many Americans.
grams like Big Brothers/Big Sisters were two to three
times as likely to start using drugs by age 16. according
Ellen Halbert of Austin was vice chairman of the
to a Public/Private Ventures study
Texas Board of Criminal Justice and is C tounding advi-
Being abused cr neglected doubles the likelihood
sorv heard member of Fight Crime: Invest: Kids
L-0220
DAILY NEWSPAPER
CHICAGO SUN - TIMES
under 4 what they fear most
nois-the ones that would expand
for their children's future, more than
funding for subsidized day care and
Chicago, IL
half of the parents said they fear
aid to struggling parents-are locked
their child will become the victim of
up in the Senate Rules Committee.
Circ-(M) 496,030 (S) 442,905
violent crime.
The other two are expected to have
When the Gallup Organization
committee hearings next week.
LATE SPORTS FINAL EDITION
asks the general public what is the
Helping kids may sound like a
MAY 2, 1997
most important problem facing the
Mom and apple pie issue, but don't
country, crime and violence consis-
be fooled. Each of these bills has
tently ranks No. 1.
staunch opponents who are targeting
When Northeastern University's
the proposals on both moral and
Center for Criminal Justice Policy
financial grounds. Opponents say
Research asked chiefs of police how
they are concerned about the content
to reduce violent crime, more than 90
of the preschool curriculum and the
percent said government ought to
lessons it might impart to vulnerable
invest in programs that help parents
children-those same children who
and give children a better start on
enter school without knowing red
life. That same 90 percent also
from green, let alone being able to
agreed that if we don't pay now, we'll
spell their own name. Others simply
pay more later in crime, welfare and
say they want the government to
other costs.
spend less money so middle-class
"We've got 39 to 40 million chil-
families can live on one income,
dren [age] 10 and under who are
freeing one parent to stay home with
entering into the crime-prone years.
If everything remains static, we can't
build prisons fast enough," said Chi-
the kids full time.
cago Police Supt. Matt Rodriguez.
That's a great goal. for those two-
He likens ignoring the problem to
parent families that choose it and
the United States being warned in
can find a way to afford it. But we no
1935 that Pearl Harbor would be
longer live in a one size.
Studies show that $1 Invested In early childhood services today saves $7.16 in jail-related costs 1
attacked in 1941 and choosing to do
America.
nothing about it.
There are 52,000 children living in
"It's ridiculous to accept [a juve-
substitute care under the Illinois
nile crime wave] as inevitable," said
Invest
kids
Department of Children and Family
Rodriguez.
Services. There are single parents.
He joined a host of law enforce-
There are two-parent families in
ment officials and crime victims this
which both need to work. And there
week to endorse legislation that
are children who need love, support
would pump more money into early
and learning-regardless of the
childhood education, high-quality
choices their parents make.
OP
pay
the
price
day care, health care for kids and
Conservatives like to deride the
help for struggling parents.
cliche that it takes a village to raise a
The ad-hoc group, which calls it.
child-at the same time they pine for
self Fight Crime: Invest in Kids, cites
the good old days when neighbors
studies that show $1 invested in early
looked out for neighbors. Well, the
neighbors are looking the other way,
childhood intervention can save
and the village is now peopled by the
$7.16 in costs later in jail, justice
government, like it or not.
Law enforcement
system and victim expenses. Yet tax-
Call your state senators and repre-
officials agree: Programs
payers urge their legislators to build
sentatives. Tell them to spend your
more prisons or get tough on crimi-
money more wisely, by investing $1
that give kids a better start
nals while complaining about propos-
in children when they're young
als to raise taxes for education or to
we won't have to spend $7.16 repair-
help reduce violent crime.
ensure infants get a good start on
ing the damage they do later.
life.
Cindy Richards is deputy editorial
By Cindy Richards
page editor of the Sun-Times. E-
mail: [email protected]
WILMINGTON NEWS-JOURNAL
WILMINGTON, oH
DAILY
7,200
This Associated Press story ran in scores of newspapers
FRIDAY
JUL 26 1996
across the county on July 26, 1996.,
BURRELLE'S
360
UT
New group wants government
to fight crime by investing in children
2838
WASHINGTON (AP) - It's easier to form a
programs designed to prevent child abuse, teach
you're only fighting defense," said former At-
child's character than to reform an adult crimi-
parenting skills, improve schools and provide
torney General Elliot Richardson, another advi-
nal, says a new group created to lobby the gov-
mentoring and after-school activities.
sory committee member. "When we can take the
ernment to spend more on children's programs.
"There is no substitute for tough law enforce-
offensive by investing in early childhood and
Investing more in these programs could push
ment today. But neither is there any excuse for
youth development, we can win the war against
down the crime rate, which is being inflated by
failing to invest today in proven strategies to
crime and make our communities safe for our
increases in youth violence, according to San-
prevent crime tomorrow," said Matt Rodriguez,
families."
ford Newman, who today announced the forma-
Chicago police superintendent and a member of
Newman said he was moved to start the orga-
tion of Fight Crime: Invest in Kids.
the group's advisory committee.
nization after awaking one night to find an in-
One of the nonprofit group's top officials is
"If we're ready to guarantee a criminal a tax-
truder crouching between his bed and his new-
Marc Klaas, who is awaiting the sentencing of
provided room and board in a jail cell, shouldn't
born daughter's crib.
the man convicted of abducting and killing his
we be just as ready to guarantee innocent kids
He said Fight Crime will form state and local
12-year-old daughter, Polly Klaas, in 1993.
space in a Head Start program or after-school
advisory committees and begin recruiting thou-
A jury in San Jose, Calif., has been hearing
program?" Rodriguez said.
sands of members and volunteers to move its
evidence in the penalty phase of the trial of
A nationwide survey reveals that most police
campaign forward.
Richard Allen Davis. He could be sentenced to
chiefs agree, the group said. Ninety-two percent
As its first project, the group will join a panel
life in prison or death.
of 548 survey respondents said they believed
C experts in criminology, child development
"Polly's killer may soon be sentenced to
putting more government resources into chil-
and law enforcement to study and make a set of
death," Klaas said in a statement. "Neither that
dren's programs would reduce crime.
policy recommendations for federal and state of-
penalty nor anything else can bring Polly back.
Nine out of 10 agreed with the statement: "If
ficials. They plan to complete a report by the end
But we can save thousands of 'children and
America does not pay for greater investments in
of September.
adults - and spare their families unimaginable
programs to help children and youth now, we
The group envisions operating on donations
heartbreak - if we invest now in the proven
will all pay far more later in crime, welfare and
from individual supporters. Its start-up support
programs that help kids get the right start."
other costs," the group said.
came from various foundations, including the An-
Head Start has proven itself as good for in-
"Locking up dangerous criminals is a neces-
nie E. Casey Foundation, the Stern Family Fund
fants and toddlers, the group said, also praising
sary defense, but you can never win a war if
and the Sisters of St. Francis of Philadelphia.
THE ATLANTA CONSTITUTION
The Atlanta Journal
Coners Disie Like the Deir
TODAY'S NEWS
Fighting crime upfront
By Gordon and Elaine Rondeau
And in Savannah, the Uhuru pro-
dren as the most effective long-
gram, providing family services,
term crime-fighting strategy when
T
hursday marked the second
mentoring and education for high-
compared with such options as try-
grim anniversary of the mur-
risk 11- to 13-year-olds, has signifi-
ing more juveniles as adults or
der of our daughter Renee, a
cantly decreased delinquency.
hiring more police.
talented, caring woman whose life
If children begin to have emo-
We must challenge our political
was cut short at 30. As we struggle
tional problems or get into trouble,
leaders to act now. We must call on
still to move on with our lives, we
counseling, drug treatment and
politicians to skip the sound bites
hear candidates in federal, state and
other programs can save them from
and tell voters what they'll do to
local elections bluster about how
becoming hardened criminals.
boost the investments in children
tough they'll be on criminals. But
Crime prevention investments
that are our most powerful weapons
most candidates are silent about our
even save tax dollars: Steve Bar-
against crime.
most powerful weapons in the battle
;
nett, an economist at Rutgers Uni-
We need to vote for candidates
against crime: the proven programs
versity, estimates that the Ypsilanti
who are ready to fight crime not
that help kids get the right start so
preschool project saves an average
only from the back end - after
they become responsible, compas-
$150,000 per child in subsequent
someone has been hurt - but also
sionate adults instead of criminals.
crime costs alone. Mark Cohen, a
from the front end, by investing in
Politicians who focus only on pun-
professor at Vanderbilt University,
today's children. Anything else is
ishments are cheating Americans
estimates that saving one high-risk
too little, too late.
out of the solutions that could have
child from a life of crime saves at
prevented Renee's death and so
least $1.5 million.
Gordon and Elaine Rondeau, who live
many others.
If ever our moral obligations
in Marietta, are founders of Action
It's no secret what prevents
coincided with our self-interest,
America: Murder Must End Now
crime: programs such as Head
this is it.
(AAMMEN) and serve on the national
Start, parenting education, good
All of us should volunteer to help
advisory committee of Fight Crime:
schools, after-school programs and
in our communities. But that can't
Invest in Kids.
job training. For example:
relieve government of its responsi-
A study in Ypsilanti, Mich.,
bility to do all it can to fight crime
shows that toddlers randomly
by playing an appropriate role to
assigned to participate in a pre-
ensure that children get the help
school program and receive weekly
they need to become responsible
home visits were 80 percent less
citizens.
likely than a control group to
Ask America's police chiefs. In a
become chronic law-breakers as
recent poll by Northeastern Univer-
adults.
sity, nine out of 10 chiefs agreed
The Quantum Opportunities Pro-
that "America could sharply reduce
gram, an after-school dropout pre-
crime if we invested more in pro-
vention program in five cities, has
grams to help children and youth
found that counseling, academic
get a good start." By a 3-1 ratio,
and life-skills support, community
police chiefs picked increasing
service and financial incentives
investments in programs for chil-
reduce the risk of arrest during
high school years by 50 percent.
the San Diego
Union- Tribune
OPINION
FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 1, 1996
Fighting crime by investing in kids
By Marc Klaas
Twenty-three years later, its researchers
cluding Oakland County Police Chief Joe
M
y daughter Polly has made a lot of
found that those kids denied the Head
Samuels and Los Angeles County Sheriff
headlines in this campaign season.
Start/parenting education program were
Sherman Block, joined recently in launch-
While I cannot support those who
five times as likely to have become chron-
ing an important new anti-crime offensive
use her tragic death to distort an oppo-
ic lawbreakers.
called Fight Crime: Invest in Kids Cam-
nent's record, I do very much want Polly's
Other studies show that help for older
paign.
death to help save other lives, and I know
kids can also significantly improve their
Polly would have felt that was the best
- and our - chances. For example,
Time, energy and tax dollars
memorial we could give her. In fact, the
when the Quantum Opportunities Pro-
Our message is simple: We'll win the
last words she said as she was led out of
gram had high school kids participate in
war on crime when we're ready to invest
her bedroom at knifepoint were a plea that
community service and gave them coun-
our time, energy and our tax dollars in
her abductor not hurt anyone else.
seling, academic help and financial incen-
America's most vulnerable children so
But if Polly's death is to help protect
tives, it cut the risk of arrest by 50 per-
that they never become America's most
others, we need to go beyond talking
cent.
wanted adults. Anything else is too little
about the death penalty, or even about
If you don't trust the studies, ask Amer-
too late.
prison sentences and focus on the most
ica's police. In a recent survey by crimi-
That's why, when I realized that Cali-
critical steps our communities and our na-
nologist Jack McDevitt, nine out of 10 po-
fornia's poorly written version of the
tion can take to protect all of our children.
lice chiefs said "America could sharply
three-strikes law was locking up people
reduce crime" if government invested
Giving them the right start
who weren't dangerous, and was taking
more in these Right Start programs.
resources away from badly needed invest-
As hard as I fought to see that Polly's
Asked which strategies would have the
ments in kids that could stop far more
killer received the death sentence he de-
greatest long-term impact in reducing
crime, I began to speak out against it.
serves, that won't bring Polly back. But
crime, police chiefs picked increasing in-
It is why I'll vote for Proposition 217,
we can save thousands of children and
vestments in kids by a 3-1 margin over
which would restore a small portion of the
adults if we invest now in the proven pro-
trying more juveniles as adults or even
funds that are needed if we are to provide
grams that help kids get the right start
hiring more police officers.
kids with adequate schools and social ser-
and keep them from becoming criminals in
Nine out of ten warned that if we don't
vices, and Proposition 210, to raise the
the first place.
boost these investments, "we will all pay
minimum wage so that young people will
The plain truth is that the most power-
far more later in crime, welfare and other
know that hard work pays, and that they
ful weapons we have against crime are
costs."
don't need to turn to crime to make ends
programs like Head Start, parenting edu-
High Scope's Perry Preschool, for ex-
meet.
cation, mentoring, good schools and after-
ample, saved $148,000 in crime costs
It's also the reason that Fight Crime:
school programs, and job training - pro-
alone for every child served. Yet these
Invest in Kids has called on candidates to
grams that can dramatically reduce crime
right-start investments are so under-fund-
tell the voters what it will do to fight crime
by helping kids become productive citi-
ed that they can't begin to serve more
before anyone gets hurt, by boosting in-
zens instead of brutal criminals. For exam-
than a small portion of the kids who need
vestment programs for kids.
ple:
them.
High/Scope Educational Research
Don't get me wrong. No one feels more
If voters want to know who's really go-
Foundation's Perry Preschool study com-
strongly than I that we need to get dan-
ing to do something about crime, they
bined a high-quality Head Start-style pro-
gerous criminals off the streets and be-
need to ask which candidates are ready
gram for 3- and 4-year-olds with weekly
hind bars.
not just to punish criminals after people
home visits to coach their parents. Due to
But if we don't invest in programs that
have been hurt, but also to make the in-
lack of funding, High Scope randomly
help children become caring citizens in-
vestments in kids that could have stopped
chose half the children who applied.
stead of brutal criminals, we will all pay an
so many of those crimes from happening
unfathomable cost in broken lives and bro-
in the first place.
KLAAS founded the Klaas Foundation for
ken hearts.
Candidates who ignore that question
Children after his 12-year-old daughter, Polly,
That's why police, prosecutors and
are ignoring our most effective weapons
was abducted and murdered.
crime survivors from all over America, in-
against crime.
BOSTON
HERALD
WILLIAM BRATTON and SANFORD NEWMAN
Fighting crime before it starts
olice, prosecutors and crime
ward off crime and violence.
P
When being abused as a child
survivors from across Amer-
The good news is that America's
nearly doubles the chances of
ica recently issued an unusu-
crime-fighting arsenal includes en-
growing up to be a violent crimi-
al challenge to Tederal, state and
ormously powerful "right-start"
nal, it's common sense to protect
local candidates. Tell the American
programs. The bad news: We're
abused children and to provide the
people, we urged, what you will do
fighting crime with one hand tied
parenting-coaching programs that
to increase the investments in kids
behind our backs because these
have been shown to cut child
that have been proven to dramati-
programs, like SO many preven-
abuse by 50-80 percent.
cally reduce crime - like Head
tion-oriented initiatives, are SO
Few of those who wind up in
Start, good schools, after-school
starved for funding that they
our prisons were born to become
programs, parenting education,
reach only a tiny fraction of the
criminals. Their behavior is
counseling for at-risk kids and
children who need them. That's
learned behavior. Offering kids the
child abuse prevention.
why so many police, prosecutors
experience and mentoring they
Have we suddenly gone soft on
and crime survivors have joined
need to become good citizens is
crime? Hardly. We know there is
together to launch a Fight Crime:
just common sense - and self-de-
no substitute for locking up dan-
Invest In Kids offensive. Our mes-
fense. Indeed, it is a basic tenet of
gerous criminals, and that efficient
sage is simple: If we want a two-
the community policing philosophy
policing matters. Between 1994
fisted attack on crime, we need to
that we have embraced in New
and 1996, tough, smart policing
give kids a helping hand.
York City.
played a key role in cutting New
When the High/Scope Founda-
That's why, in a recent survey
York City's violent crime rate by
tion's research tells us that kids
conducted by Northeastern Uni-
36 percent. But policy-makers
denied its early childhood program
versity criminologist Jack McDe-
should not draw the wrong lesson
were five times as likely to become
vitt, nine out of 10 police chiefs
from that experience. Prevention
multipe offenders, and Syracuse
agreed that "America could sharp-
of crime is the ultimate goal - not
University's research tell us those
ly reduce crime if government in-
just officially responding to it.
denied its services were 10 times
vested more" in programs for kids.
Those of us who have been on
as likely to engage in delinquency,
Skimping on investments in kids
the front lines know that, in the
it's common sense to provide early
is penny-wise and pound-foolish.
long run, winning the war on
childhood programs.
crime also will require cutting the
When the peak hours for juven-
William Bratton was New
enemy's key supply line: its ability
ile crime are between school dis-
York City police commissioner
to turn kids into criminals. Each
missal and 6 p.m., and when stu-
from January 1994 to April 1996,
day gangs and drug dealers assi-
dies of programs like Big
Boston police commissioner in
dously recruit our children for
Brothers/Big Sisters mentoring
1993 and is currently vice chair-
their army. To fight back, we must
shows they cut by 30-50 percent
man of First Security Services
utilize other powerful crime fight-
the risk of kids using drugs or en-
Corporation.
ing weapons - the proven "right-
gaging in violence, it's common
Sanford Newman is an attor-
start" programs and strategies
sense to provide after-school,
ney who has been a victim of
that give kids the armor of values,
weekend and summer tutoring,
crime and is president of Fight
skills, and positive experiences to
mentoring and recreation.
Crime: Invest in Kids.
The Charlotte Observer
METRO EDITION
+
C
MONDAY, OCTOBER 28, 1996
The economics of crime: Pay now or pay later
quality Head Start-type program
never win the war on crime until it
sharply reduce crime if gover
rosecutors know America will never win the war on crime
when they were 3 to 4 years old,
invests more in getting kids the
ment invested more in program
ntil it invests more in getting kids the right start.
with weekly at-home coaching for
right start. We can pay now or pay
for kids," and warned that if we c
their parents. A look at arrest
later.
not increase those investmen
records 23 years after the toddlers
Police chiefs agree. Chief Den-
now, "we will pay far more later
finished the program found that
nis Nowicki says, "Shortchanging
crime, welfare and other costs."
By PETER GILCHRIST
fighters have joined together to
those who had not received the
prevention efforts shortchanges
Despite all the evidence, Co
Special to The Observer
launch a nonpartisan campaign
services were five times as likely to
public safety. We need to be as
gress has so shortchanged Hea
rime is a major issue in fed-
called Fight Crime: Invest In Kids
have more than four arrests.
ready to provide tutoring or an
Start that it can serve only a thi
eral, state and local elections
and to write to all the nation's
Syracuse University's Family
after-school program for innocent
of our most vulnerable 3 and 4 yet
across the country.
candidates.
Development Research Program
kids as we are to guarantee crimi-
olds. Other programs serve eve
Most candidates spare no effort
Of course, they are determined
shows a 90 percent cut in delin-
nals room and board in a jail cell."
smaller fractions of the kids will
prove they are the "toughest in
to lock up dangerous criminals.
quency resulting from early child-
Raleigl Police Chief Mitchell
need them. We can be proud
their district." But
But here's their challenge to candi-
hood programs.
Brown says that when politicians
North Carolina's Smart Start con
few bother to tell
dates: What will you do to increase
The Quantum Opportunities
ignore these right-start invest-
munity-based initiatives for kid
us what they will
the front-end investments proven
Program showed that involving
ments, "they are throwing away
but far more remains to be done
do to strengthen
to dramatically reduce crime -
vulnerable high school kids in
the weapons that could help us get
When you cast your votes, a
our most powerful
like parenting education, Head
community service and providing
the upper hand against crime."
which candidates are ready to fig
weapons against
Start, child abuse prevention, after-
them with counseling and with
Greensboro Chief Sylvester
crime from the front end by inve
crime - the
school programs, and programs to
academic and other support cut in
Daughtry says, "We have to keep
ing in today's children rather th
proven invest-
keep kids from falling behind in
half the number who wound up
putting dangerous criminals be-
only from the back end after som
ments that help
school?
arrested.
hind bars. But we have to fight just
one has been hurt. If voters want
kids get the right
What makes us think programs
Last year, our office dealt with
illchrist
as hard to keep kids from becom-
know who is really going to
start in life so they
like these prevent crime? First-
9,000 felonies and sent a lot of
ing criminals in the first place, and
something about crime, that is
(Tow up to be contributing citizens
hand, hard-nosed, real-world expe-
people to prison - enough to tell
that means getting all kids the
key question to ask.
instead of criminals.
rience - and scientific evidence
me that street criminals and drug
early childhood care, the good
This month, police, prosecutors
like this:
dealers are recruiting new troops
schools, and the youth programs
nd crime survivors from around
Peter Gilchrist is Mecklenburg
High/Scope's Perry Preschool
for their army about as fast as we
they need."
County district attorney. Write hi
he country, fed up with political
randomly selected half of a group
can get them locked up.
In a recent poll, 9 out of 10 police
c/o The Observer, P.O. Box 30308
logans, said "Enough!" The crime
of vulnerable kids to receive a high
Prosecutors know America will
chiefs agreed that "America could
Charlotte, NC 28230-0308.
David Broder's column about FIGHT CRIME: INVEST IN KIDS ran in more than
140 newspapers nationwide including The Washington Post, Atlanta Journal &
Constitution, Houston Chronicle, Seattle Time & Post Intelligencer, San Diego
Union Tribune, Cleveland Plain Dealer, Oregonian, Pittsburgh Post Gazette, and
many others.
David Broder
Pseudo-tough talk about juvenile crime
2838
What
W
ASHINGTON - It is a fascinating
ty-based groups, including religious or-
paradox of politics that the further
works is
ganizations, and four times that amount
removed an official is from the front
for investigating, prosecuting and jail-
lines of the war on crime, the tougher
early work
ing juvenile offenders. The whole $500
he talks.
million would be paid for by cutting
That is particularly true of violence by
with kids.
"social spending provisions" of the 1994
juveniles, a problem that Americans
crime bill, including after-school and
rightly find alarming.
family counseling programs.
When Republican candidate Bob Dole
James Alan Fox, the Northeastern
talked about it in a radio address earlier
best tool and a somewhat larger group
University center's director, presented
this month, he promised to crack down
said the priority should be making par-
studies from criminology literature
on these "merciless criminals capable of
ents legally liable when their children
showing that intensive early interven-
commit crimes.
committing the most vicious acts for the
tion can reduce the later delinquency
most trivial reasons: a pair of sneakers
The overwhelming majority - three
and criminal behavior of at-risk youths
or a football jersey."
out of every four big city chiefs and
by as much as 80 percent. In Lansing,
When President Clinton responded a
three out of five in the overall sample -
Mich., when police, schools and social
few days later, he spoke in ominous
said the best way to reduce crime and
service agencies began youth programs
tones of the fact that in the last two
violence is to increase investment in
in a new community center, the number
decades, "The number of homicides by
programs that help children and youths
of crimes in nearby neighborhoods was
teens who have guns has tripled."
get a good start.
cut from 156 in 1990 to 40 in 1993.
These findings were reported at a
BOTH SAID prosecutors should have
I was skeptical about these case stud-
Washington press briefing last week by
ies. But John J. Dilulio Jr., of Princeton,
much more leeway to try juveniles as
a new advocacy group calling itself
a scholar whose work is much admired
adults.
"Fight Crime: Invest in Kids." run by an
by conservatives and who was not part
"If a teen-ager commits a crime as an
activist named Sanford Newman. Par-
adult," Clinton said, "he should be pros-
of this group, told me, "The more scien-
ticipants included police chiefs of Chi-
tific the study, the stronger the link and
ecuted as an adult."
cago and Buffalo, former chiefs of New
the more positive the rest We now
Before leaving the Senate, Dole intro-
York City, Detroit and Washington and
can say with some confidence that pro-
duced legislation to allow adult prosecu-
the head of the largest police organiza-
grams that get responsible adults in-
tion of people as young as 13 and the
tion, the Fraternal Order of Police.
volved with at-risk kids can reduce later
death penalty at 16.
A cynic might argue that the chiefs -
delinquency and crime."
But when a cross section of police
who are. after all, mostly appointees -
chiefs was surveyed by Northeastern
have just found new rhetoric to support
THAT IS of enormous importance, be-
University's Center for Criminal Justice
old programs that pump federal money
cause teen-agers have the highest arrest
Policy on the effectiveness of four ap-
into the cities.
rate for violent offense and in the next
proaches to reducing crime and vio-
But the cynical view will not with-
decade, the number of teen-agers will
lence, the least favored option was the
stand the sincerity of people like Gil
explode. There are now 39 million chil-
one candidates Dole and Clinton have
Kerlikowske of Buffalo, who com-
dren under age 10, the most since the
endorsed - and many governors al-
plained, "The preventive programs are
1950s.
ready have put into effect.
getting lost because everyone (in poli-
Prosecuting teen criminals as adults
Only 14 percent of the 540 chiefs
tics) is trying to grow hair on his chest
may satisfy political pressures, but we
chose the policy of trying more juve-
in this election year."
better be serious about preventing their
niles as adults and sentencing more of
What he means is illustrated by the
younger brothers from becoming crimi-
them to adult prisons.
juvenile crime bill Dole introduced. It
nals - or we are in big trouble.
About the same number said hiring
would allocate $100 million a year for
additional police officers would be the
prevention programs run by communi-
Washington Post Writers Group