Oasis Technique - A Method of Controlling Crime and Improving the Quality of Life (From Police Leadership in America, P 322-331, 1985, William A Geller, ed. - See NCJ-98325)

• NCJ Number: 99255
• Author(s): W H Lindsey; R Cochran; B Quint; M Rivera
• Date Published: 1985
• Length: 10 pages
• Sale Source: Praeger Publishers
• Publication Type: Program/Project Evaluation
• Language: English
• Country: United States of America

Annotation

This evaluation of the Oasis Technique, which involves Ft. Lauderdale, Fla, police and public housing officials cooperating with responsible residents to reduce crime and improve housing, shows that the program resulted in an overall improvement of the quality of life in high-crime neighborhoods.

Abstract

The Oasis Technique has police and housing officials jointly selecting neighborhoods where crime and housing problems are clearly related. The police then increase patrols and court-sanctioned raids in these areas while housing officials increase housing modernization, rehabilitation, and other physical improvements for the benefit of the neighborhood's law-abiding residents. The coalition of police, housing officials, and responsible residents is designed to increase property values that will trigger reinvestment by the private sector to counter neighborhood deterioration. The program evaluation focused on crime statistics between 1982 and 1983, particularly for crimes designated as 'quality-of-life' crimes: disorderly conduct, drug-related street crime, breaking and entering, assault, and robbery. There were substantially fewer quality-of-life crimes in the Oasis sites compared with other low-income neighborhoods in the city. Moreover, the overall crime rates in the Oasis areas compared well with the rates in upper-income neighborhoods. Seven notes are provided.