U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government, Department of Justice.

NCJRS Virtual Library

The Virtual Library houses over 235,000 criminal justice resources, including all known OJP works.
Click here to search the NCJRS Virtual Library

Problem-Oriented Policing in Public Housing: The Jersey City Evaluation

NCJ Number
182051
Journal
Justice Quarterly Volume: 17 Issue: 1 Dated: March 2000 Pages: 129-158
Author(s)
Lorraine Green Mazerolle; Justin Ready; William Terrill; Elin Waring
Date Published
March 2000
Length
30 pages
Annotation

This paper reports the evaluation results of a problem-oriented policing project that attempted to reduce serious crime and drug market problems in six public housing sites in Jersey City, New Jersey.

Abstract

The program was a cooperative effort by Jersey City’s Public Housing Authority and Police Department to reduce serious crime (violent, drug, and property crimes in particular) at three high-rise and three low-rise housing sites. The study attempted to answer three broad research questions: (1) the effect of the problem-oriented policing program on serious crime both across and within the study sites; (2) the types of problem-solving responses that were effective; and (3) differences in the effectiveness of problem-oriented policing across different categories of crime. The article reviews past efforts to control crime in public housing; describes the Jersey City program; summarizes the evaluation data; and describes the analytic strategy. It also presents and discusses research findings as well as the theoretical, methodological, and practical implications of the research. Notes, tables, figures, references