funding for this program was

provided by the national institute of justice. the. district lost a 19 year

corrections. hello, i'm. and crime is a problem for many of the three and one half million americans who live public housing, robberies, assaults and rampant drug dealing are everyday occurrences that corridors and public spaces into danger zones arrayed against these conditions are housing authorities, police agencies and public housing residents. they are seeking ways to control crime and assure decent quality of life in their communities. one factor the physical environment what a public housing complex like. another factor the type and extent of law enforcement. whether the police are remote

from tenants or work closely with them. and still another the amount intensity of tenant involvement. all these factors a role in boston. this is many people visualize when they think public housing they're dirt stark concrete, ugly brick temporary warehouses poor people. then when mission hill was first built in 1952, it was beautiful, but it was at least clean, relatively safe. but that was before an epidemic of drug abuse destroy the tenant's way of life, the milkman used come in. sharon's men used to come. i mean, everybody used to come to your door and sell this and that. it was really nice. it was a mixed neighborhood. we had blacks and whites. it was real pretty at the grass, everything. this place clean and then you got the drug problems. they robbed the mailman. they'd rather share basement.

the gangs just started ripping them off, and they stopped coming. their own people off to roofs, finding people dead. the elevators, you know, going up the staircase and maybe someone laying there dead. it was really rough on three or they've addicted to crack and they've gone right to hell. physically, emotionally, mentally. it's it's unbelievable what one drug can effect a community mission. maine, as this development is called, is a tough beat. drugs are sold. law enforcement is stretched. there are only 26 housing authority police for all of boston, but it doesn't have to be way. just down the street on the site of the old mission hill extension the rebuilt and renamed alice taylor apartments seem part of another world.

the renovations were pushed by a tenants task force at a cost of roughly $20 million. one of those tenants was hattie dudley. you have to take on attitude that says we're not going to take it anymore and that we're going to do what we have to do to make a difference. and we brought about that change because, first of all, it with one person and then everybody else said, well, yeah, i can go along with that. and then the residents formulated a group said we could stick together on this. we all can come together and we have made a difference because we stuck together looking at something is in development talking about the design all. curtis jones was manager of mission hill extension when the renovations began. he is now director of public safety for the boston housing authority. you take care now. people expect public housing to bad. that is in our attitude. we expect it to look good because the better it looks better the environment, the better the attitude, the better the attitude, the less the crime. so we use the general standards that everyone goes by of what

you would like in your own personal communities. most departments, their own entrances, not common corridors where criminals can slip in one door and out another. peaked roofs have replaced flat roofs, removing another police problem. low fences, green grass shrubs and trees. all designed to encourage tenants pride. discourage criminal behavior. abandoned cars are towed away. broken lights and windows are promptly fixed. even new graffiti is removed within 24 hours. graffiti. anything that shows is a mismanagement. we tried to attack because it's important that the residents know someone is in control. cannot give up control to drug dealers. to give up control to again, the the negative pieces of society tenants and housing officials

drive a family atmosphere with playgrounds, courts and programs for young people. what happens is when young people feel good about where live just like older people, then they don't mess up as much. i mean, when you have an outlet for the energy, you know, all the negative stuff kind of gets put on the back burner. a new relationship between law enforcement and tenants also had to be established. before it was always like a tug of war with the police. so we wanted to make them be comfortable in here, let them know that everybody wasn't bad people, because they view this all as as thugs, you know. and we were not thugs. we've solved murders. we've cut the drug problem. and it's all been within itself. there are eyes and ears and we will send in an undercover to see if he can make a purchase. should he make a purchase of drugs from that unit immediately

we go forward with getting a search warrant for that unit. and within a short period of time proximately 24 to 48 hours, we end up serving that search warrant. i'm scared the drug dealers, but if i see i'm doing something, i will tell because it is best to be scared. you know, i'm scared if don't tell them because they might hurt one of my kids. and all it takes is that one person make an attitude change, and then another person making the attitude change. and it's the whole task force. make it you need everybody in development making an attitude. either you just need 5 to 6 people and you got. people have to have ownership. they have to have a sense that it's theirs and it has to. beautiful. there's no reason to have it looking as if it's unkept and not maintained anyone. and that's been our major is to change the mental attitude of people by changing the environment. started out phrase get in all of a sudden we said no more. we have to live here.

we have no place else to go. it's time to fight back. and that's what we did. and we're going to fight to keep it with me to discuss these matters, vincent lane, chairman of the chicago housing authority, major roberson of the tulsa, oklahoma police department, and hattie dudley of the tenants task force at boston's alice taylor apartments. ms. dudley you have been part of a movement that has transformed the public housing project right down the street, as we saw in film, there is in the same neighborhood, another housing project that doesn't look anything like alice taylor homes apart from the physical changes. what would you say is the key factor that has been responsible for the transformation of conditions in your project. basically the reorientation of our families to family living and having them come together to work on the issues that we're confronted. how do you get people to come together? well, once people see that we've made a physical change, people feel that it's need there.

it is their responsibility to come together and that they get what's needed what do they do for you? basically come like talk in meetings, say what's going on, you know, give reports. the police come to meetings and speak with the police about what's going on. they when they see somebody vandalizing in the area or, painting graffiti or loitering or doing things that create problems, the neighbors, are they willing to speak, tell the people face to face, stop that is our home? or do they have to rely on the police to make that? i think it depends who's doing the graffiti or doing the crime the time. if it's just a kid with a can of paint, then they probably confront kid. but if it's a gang member or someone who they feel will put them in danger, they probably would call the police, you know, not give their name, but call in the incident as somebody said on the program earlier, the view that many people in the united states have is that public housing projects are filled with criminals and therefore they're hopeless. and so tends to turn your back

on it. now have lived in mission hill. you are a resident and you're a tenant organizer. what proportion of the tenants in your in alice taylor homes would you say are in some sense troublemakers? this is my proportion of troublemakers that live there and everyone else a decent law abiding citizens and you know they're looking to live and and be american what property is part of the drug dealing or does drug dealing come from is this something that started by one or two tenant residents? is this outsiders coming into the project? i think it's outsiders who come in and certainly some of our people get roped this, you know, of having more money and new sneakers, all those kinds of things. but it starts with outsider. now, if you find a tenant that is acting an undesirable way, participating in, drug dealing or criminality, what legal options are open to you or the housing authority to have that person evicted. well, in boston, there's a new law on the book. if a person is dealing drugs from their, you know, are in and

around the any public house and they can be evicted within 24 hours. what we usually do as a tenant organizer is i'll go and talk to that tenant and say there's been some, you know, report on your action and give them an opportunity to clean that up. so that they get it legally as well, you know, informally. now, have you ever been the object of any retaliation from people who don't like the fact that drug dealing is no longer welcome estate all the time? and does that worry? it doesn't me, in fact, because a lot of other people who who who's there to support me, you know provide me with the support i need to kind of keep going and say do it again. has there actually been a retaliation against anybody since this program began. i don't think there's been any retailer. and i probably had a couple ties cut off like a couple of times, but not. no. no physical. i see. what? selecting new tenants to come in. obviously, if you're emphasizing family and working together in a

community way, you would like tenants coming who share those. what process exist for screening people to make sure that the right kind of tenant comes in to your home. well, there's a part of the housing authority now that we've negotiating with them over several years. and there is and they inclusion now of criminal record check and also, you know, tenant payment like how they pay their rent. so there's a civil of what you have to do now to have references to get into. let me ask some of the same questions to vince lane, who runs one of the largest, if not the largest public housing authorities in country. and that's the chicago housing authority. what proportion of your would you say have, been transformed into the kind of livable conditions that we see in the alice taylor homes in boston? how progress is being made? well, i'll tell you, jim, we haven't made that much progress terms of what i've saw here with alice taylor. but we have taken about 21 of

our high rise buildings and. we have about 125 troubled high rise buildings in. and we've taken 25 of those buildings and made them livable. and how do you do that? we do it through something called emergency housing inspections. otherwise known in chicago as operation clean sweep, where we will go a gang infested drug dealing, high rise environment and together with chicago police department, utilizing their staff and our staff about a total of a of almost 100 people create lobbies because there are no lobbies in our high rises and issue photo id cards to residents go through every apartment identified by unauthorized occupants the apartments get them off the property and then follow up with

a thorough cleaning of the building, getting rid of urine, the stairwells, painting the galleries and putting lights throughout the property. for years, the chicago housing had the reputation in the country having some of the worst managed public housing projects in the country and all. that's a fair statement. you are a relatively recent appointee. was that deserved? and if so, why were conditions that bad? well, i think the reputation deserved. clearly when i came to the chicago authority, there was poor management, terrible management. employees were hired, not because of the job they could do. but because of who was their political sponsor. contractors took our funds and didn't deliver quality work or no at all. and there were a few who received perks and but the

masses of residents were basically not given service. so you've had to try to professionalize the entire of the chicago housing authority. that's correct. many of us recall the incident many years ago when a high rise public housing project in saint louis pruitt-igoe project, became so bad, the authorities moved everyone out and dynamited and the whole building fell down. is it possible to have effective community life in a rise building in a city such as? or is the high rise itself an enemy of public safety? well, is, of course, of a topic of great debate the country. i personally believe that it is not the bricks and mortar make the difference in public housing. it is people and i believe that yes. can have a decent life life in a high building. what have been your relationships? the police. you have a housing authority police and you have the chicago police department. do they appreciate what you're trying to do.

do they work effectively with you? what is no question about it. in fact, our housing authority police was just created and it was created the first class graduated in march of of this and of of of 90 and we got that class through with the help of chicago police department. so they're looking for help from us and view us as competition. but as a complement to their police efforts. major, obviously, in my years of riding around with the police and listening to police talk in the locker room, not as many years as you've had that role, you get the impression that many police departments believe that persons in public housing projects. are really out of control and that the job of the police is try to contain it, set a barrier around it, but not actively work with the residents to help manage that. have you noticed that change in any substantial. well, i think that is changing

with the with the emphasis towards community policing that's going today. we have discovered that that policing from the perimeter does not work, that it's going spill over that and for the sheer fact that that the people who live inside public housing are not what the police perceive them to be. and the only way to that is for the police to get in, get out their cars, talk to the people and work with them. how easy is it to get police officers out of their car, to walk around, talk to people in public housing projects? well, it's it's difficult, i guess, at the moment that, as i say, it is as they as they do these things and get out and discover what what the reality is and adjust their strategies to that and see that those strategies work. and if they can make a difference, these complexes, it becomes easier and easier. and how do you manage to patrol in public housing project when at least if it's a high rise building or even a large building generally? so much of the community life of the building occurs in the

corridors. it doesn't occur in public spaces. can you patrol corridors? well, the officers have to get out of their car. foot patrol is one of the things that works very effectively. i think public housing in those kind of situations, just the police cannot do it from their vehicle. they have to get out, get a tenant to talk to the tenants, and then you find that you get a lot of information that helps you direct your energies to those. and, you know, there may be a drug enforcement that has to go on, but it cannot go on in isolation without the community. well, let's talk about how you follow on the drug enforcement strategy. what are your powers in a public housing project to stop and frisk tenants that you suspect are involved? drug dealing? well, we would have to be able to articulate, you know, the circumstances under which we were we were during the stop and frisk. if it's a known drug area where a lot drug arrests have been made, in particular on corner and certain actions that are associated with, then sometimes

there are i know some some cities have gotten legal descriptions, laws created that that allow off. but you have to be acting on the basis of reasonable suspicion, not just. yes, yes, yes. and it can't be you know, they have to be engaging in some kind of overt activity. and when you do a stop and frisk, do you find that this helps reduce drug trafficking or something more dramatic calls for how? do you deal with the problem beyond simply containing it? well, as i said, you have to get the tenants involved. they have to be willing to take a stand. it's all it's all the issues are all very interrelated. you know, you can't just go in wipe out drug drug dealing because it is connected. so with the with the way of life and in public housing and that sometimes i know that we discovered that a lot of times when we take the drug dealers out, we're also taking out transportation for the for the tenants in a lot of items like that. so you have to go in and you have to network with the entire community.

social service agencies and the housing authority to bring in those programs and services that you're actually taking away from. let let me talk about a larger aspect of this issue. we've been talking what the tenants can do, what housing officials can do, what the police can do is a more fundamental change is done. would it be desirable, for example, if the tenants owned or their own public housing projects, what was their property that they were defending? i think it is. i think they have to have a sense of ownership, whether they own it or not. i think it is also conceivable that tenant is possible if the development is small enough to be managed by the residents. i would caution that we would like to just say manage properties, don't have the resources with it so that management is a passive polity with proper resources, so that you were to manage it as a tenants. this would require an additional level of resources or certainly no reduction in resources for this to work properly, i think we would need additional

resources. what about owning it? what if somebody gave you a chance? buy it out under some subsidized loan basis? would this be desirable? well, our development has recently been i think it is a desirable process for us to look at. but i would not suggest that tenants go out and own something that needs to be rehabbed and a lot of money put into it. mr. what is your experience or what are your thoughts about tenant ownership or tenant management? i think it's the foundation of turning around public in this country. clearly, if the residents want a better life, no matter. how many billions of dollars you put into it, you won't get a better life in chicago. i've encouraged. we have seven resident management corporations in one of which has been managing the entire development for a year. and how does that work? take that one example and tell me briefly how it works. well, what happens is we in?

enter into an agreement with the residents of a development and then we start with them along with their own technical assistance providers to give that to train them in real estate management and leadership training. and so forth. then after they've come a pretty good distance in terms of of knowledge, we enter into a dual management role with where we have our staff and residents performing the same duties for a period of one year. and then we literally give the keys to the resident management group and they the same resources as any other in our system and. they then hire the housing manager. they are all of their own employees as they set their budgets, they hire the contractors to provide maintenance work or repair work.

as this worked out in this case where it's been done, it is the results are very, very satisfying and. do you see any pitfalls along the way? ms. dudley said the tenant management only works if there is an appropriate of resources. do you see that there a resource problem here in doing this more? well, clearly a couple of things could present problems. one, the development is too massive and the surrounding neighborhood has problems that it that could be real a real troublesome situation for residents who are just beginning to tend to get into management. the other thing is if there is a significant backlog in terms of deferred maintenance, where you've got, you know an unusual amount of problem as that occurs. so i think you have to pick the development and pick environment that the development is where residents can truly be affected. let ask you a question that came out of something that ms. dudley said. she talked about the advantages a small unit, that facility

management facilitates improvement, a built high rise buildings up and down state street. is it feasible. given political and economic realities, to add public housing in a city as chicago in small units on small, scattered? is that a feasible option? it absolutely is. and what kind of resistance do you get from neighborhoods that, oh, we don't want public housing in our neighborhood. well, i think we get resistance because of the history the chicago housing authority. and one of the things that we're doing to try to overcome that as we build scattered housing, i'm turning that scatter site over to local private developers and nonprofit community development corporations. we, in fact, are even them build a housing to lessen the fear of the community that the once it's built that it won't be managed properly. let me ask major robinson something about this. you've traveled around the country as well, as worked in

tulsa on the problem of getting the police into closer relationship with the communities. if you were dealing with the police from a big city as chicago has these massive rise public housing projects in a long reputation for having problems. what would you tell the police that could possibly overcome their concern that if the first day they go in there, somebody's going to be on the rooftop taking a shot at them? how do you overcome those concerns? well, it's it's one thing we have to take a very long time. certainly not going to happen that i know that our experience tulsa was to to convince them to try. you know and like i said, one success builds upon another. we sent a thick patrol in, i guess, with daily threats that bad things were going to happen to those foot patrol. and the threats never became a reality. not saying that they wouldn't be in it in a much larger city with bigger problems than what were experiencing. but if if the police are fearful

going in and fearful taking on the problems there, then then there is no one left, you know, to go in and handle those things. and so i think you have to feel the sensitivity. do you see police's attitude toward the residents to change as they begin to make more precise distinctions of their mind between, so to speak, the good guys, the bad guys after they have met more than. yes, i think real problem is, is the generalization and the in the perceptions that the police have initially, you know, of going in feeling that everybody that lives in housing is against them. and once they discover that everyone is not and that there are a lot of good people there who are being victimized and that that can appeal, again, you know, to the sensitivities of the police who feel like they are there to protect the. have you seen in boston this problem of perception in the boston police department that there are little locked into little suspicious or little concern and about meeting you halfway on territory? yes, there has been, but we've put a lot of time and effort into making sure that are

comfortable and that they know the people in the neighborhood that they can get support from immediately. what would, in your judgment, be the single most important thing that government society at some level could do to take the improvement in public housing to the next stage? what is it we most need today? i guess respect. i think we need to respect each other and begin to realize that we are all people and what we all are looking for is a decent and that's all and not a vast more vastly more resources or some new scheme. this has to be done at a people to people basis. that's right. the people. the people. you're not turning down more money. right. no, we're not. you're not turning it down. but, you know, i think that's the key to. i don't think that's the key. i think that that's helpful. but i don't think that's the key. whatever your to this question, mr. lang, what is the one thing that this society or government could most do to make a difference right now? i think to give residents respect and to change the way we deliver public housing. and that is not stack people on

top of poor people. we need a social economic mix. we need to build housing that poor people can live in and not housing for poor people. i see in the socioeconomic mix is something that doesn't exist today in many communities. that's exactly what. thank you, ladies and gentlemen. and thank you for for crime file. i'm james wilson. crime is a production of c f productions inc., which is

solely responsible. its content funding for this program was by the national institute of justice research, arm of the u.s.