NCJ Number
80270
Date Published
Unknown
Length
110 pages
Annotation
This final report describes the components and achievements of the Community Crime Prevention Program (CCPP) of Cambridge, Mass.
Abstract
As of March 31, 1981, the CCPP terminated its coordinating crime prevention operations. Two years earlier the CCPP began with a LEAA grant to Cambridge Community Services. The original grant called for the creation of a nine-component crime prevention program in a city where community-based crime prevention was almost nonexistent. Because of the short-term nature of the grant, efforts focused on developing programs that could be integrated into existing systems. Within 2 years, CCPP has been successful in facilitating the interface of over 125 groups and agencies and 10,000 citizens around the agenda of crime prevention. CCPP expanded from its original 9 components to 24, which serviced almost every ethnic and age group in the city. The program's success in meeting its objectives had been measured by how many citizens were educated and remain mobilized after the CCPP phaseout and how many crime prevention programs 'seeded' by CCPP funding are now funded and institutionalized within other agencies. Notable successes were the Block Watch program, which organized at least 2,500 people in 75 neighborhoods to be alert to crimes in progress and suspicious circumstances in their communities; community education and outreach, which mobilized about 3,000 people in a variety of community activities and presentations; and the dispute settlement center, which continues to help resolve neighborhood disputes short of court action. The objectives and activities of each component are discussed.