Evaluation of the Riverside Comprehensive Community-Wide Approach to Gang Prevention, Intervention and Suppression

• NCJ Number: 209188
• Author(s): Irving A. Spergel; Kwai M. Wa; Rolando V. Sosa
• Date Published: October 2003
• Length: 380 pages
• Grant Number(s): 97-MU-FX-K014-S-4
• Agencies: OJJDP-Sponsored
• Publication Type: Program/Project Evaluation

Annotation

This report presents the methodology and findings of the evaluation of Riverside's (California) Comprehensive Community-Wide Approach to Gang Prevention, Intervention, and Suppression Program, which was part of the national evaluation of the model gang program promoted under grants from the U.S. Justice Department's Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention (OJJDP).

Abstract

The OJJDP model involved multiple agencies interactively addressing individual youth, family members, and gang peers. The five core model strategies were community mobilization, social intervention, provision of social opportunities, suppression/social control, and organizational change and development. The Riverside project, which was established in 1995 as a test of the OJJDP model, changed its name to BRIDGE (Building Resources for the Intervention and Deterrence of Gang Engagement) in 1999. Its 5-year (1995-2000) period of operations focused on two areas of the city with high rates of gang crime, with another gang-crime community selected as a comparison area. The program, established as a pilot effort, initially targeted gang-involved youth 12 to 21 years old who were on probation and involved in violent gang activity. One of the strongest components of the project was the employment-training and participation program of the Riverside Department of Human Resources. Also, two Riverside Police Department lieutenants assigned to the project had critical influence in community mobilization of agencies, program innovation, and administration. The evaluation involved a quasi-experimental design and multiple sources of data on project activities and outcomes. Measured outcomes focused on arrests of program and comparison youth. Program youth were three times as successful in the odds ratio of success to failure in reducing arrests for serious violence; they also had a lower ratio of failure to success for repeat drug arrests. Apparently the project did not reduce youth's membership and involvement in gangs relative to that of comparison youth during the project period. Extensive tables and figures and 80 references