Program Profile: Tulsa (Oklahoma) Community-Based Crime Reduction Initiative

This is a police-driven, collaborative, place-based crime-reduction approach focused on a target neighborhood in Tulsa, Okla. The program is rated Promising. The initiative resulted in statistically significant reductions in total crime in both areas of the target neighborhood at the two post-intervention periods and a statistically significant reduction in burglary in one area. There were no statistically significant reductions in disorderly offenses and mixed results on the number of assaults.

A Promising rating implies that implementing the program may result in the intended outcome(s).

Program Goals/Target Population

Tulsa’s Community-Based Crime Reduction (CBCR) Initiative is a collaborative effort between the Tulsa (Okla.) Police Department and the University of Cincinnati. It was designed to support data-driven, comprehensive, and community-based strategies to reduce crime and promote revitalization within a 1.25-square-mile targeted neighborhood referred to as 61st Street and Peoria Avenue (the area was later renamed to “Hope Valley” as part of the initiative). The initiative aims to develop a collaborative and community-based network of practitioners and researchers to address chronic problems through numerous strategies and areas of focus. The goal of the Tulsa CBCR Initiative is to reduce crime in targeted locations and improve citizens’ perceptions of risk and safety.

Program Components

The Tulsa CBCR Initiative was developed as a collaborative place-based crime reduction approach that included 1) problem identification, 2) interagency and multistakeholder partnerships, and 3) channeling resources into high-risk problem locations by using a variety of strategies, tactics, and approaches. Based on previous research (Intriligator, 1992; Weiss, Anderson, and Lasker, 2002; Le Ber and Branzei, 2010) the framework underlying the partnerships was based on the following principles

• The interagency goals of the initiative had to align with the agency-specific objectives for each of the partners.
• The operating policies of the initiative were developed to ensure that each partner had clear and specific objectives enabling them to contribute to the initiative.
• Relational attachments were emphasized to help address turnover among personnel from the target agencies.

The foundation of the Tulsa CBCR Initiative included allocating roles appropriately across partners and ensuring ongoing communication and feedback regarding partner activities. Tulsa Police Department officials shared crime incident data, assigned officers to patrol high-risk locations, and used a community resource officer to guide enforcement efforts by police and local security companies. The University of Cincinnati research team conducted crime analyses and guided the research methods. Apartment managers in the target area (particularly at the Savanna Landing apartment complex, where crime analyses had shown a heavy concentration of offenses) developed and implemented rental policies that shifted high-risk individuals away from the property (e.g., assaults were dealt with by evicting individuals who fought on the premises).

The initiative employed crime prevention through environmental design strategies, with Savanna Landing security personnel and Tulsa Police Department officers making recommendations on how security and surveillance could be improved (i.e., lighting, cameras, fencing, gateway entry, and security surveillance and patrols). Further, local city officials (including members of Tulsa City Council) developed and implemented a local legislative policy, a Nuisance Abatement Order, to provide the team with additional leverage to gain compliance from uncooperative business owners. Resident groups developed steering committees to provide feedback to the police, business, and government officials engaged in the process, and to involve fellow citizens into prosocial activities such as community gatherings.

Study 1

Corsaro and Engel (2020a) conducted an interrupted time-series analysis with a comparison condition to assess the impact of the Tulsa Community-Based Crime Reduction (CBCR) Initiative on crime counts at two locations in the target neighborhood. Within the Hope Valley target neighborhood in Tulsa (which falls under the Riverside Police Division of the Tulsa Police Department), analysis of Uniform Crime Reporting Part I violent and property crime data showed a heavy concentration of offenses within a large apartment complex called Savanna Landing. Property crime offenses, driven primarily by burglaries, were also most frequent in Savanna Landing. Concentration of crime was also observed at the Kwick Stop convenience store in Hope Valley, and resident surveys indicated that this location was a dangerous and undesirable place to visit because of fear of victimization. Therefore, the analysis focused on outcomes in Savanna Landing and at the Kwick Stop. Specifically, the CrimeSolutions review of Study 1 focused on the effect of the Tulsa CBCR Initiative on crime incident counts in Savanna Landing at the 21-month post-intervention period. Through the initiative, considerable investments were made in Savanna Landing, including 24-hour surveillance and a remodeling effort that included bolstering of crime prevention through design efforts (such as gating the complex, renovating the park and children’s areas, and installing security cameras).

Criminal incident data obtained from the Tulsa Police Department were examined to assess the changes in official measures of crime. These criminal incident data were aggregated into a monthly format from January 2010 through February 2020, which equated to more than 7 years of pre-intervention data and 21 months of post-intervention data for the Savanna Landing location. The remainder of the Riverside Police Division served as a comparison analysis for each crime outcome to assess the degree by which a general trend in the area may have affected crime in the targeted areas. The primary covariate, a post-intervention reference measure, was operationalized as May 2018 and thereafter in Savanna Landing (given the 24-hour security implementation and crime prevention through environmental design change features that were implemented at this time). All months prior to the intervention period (January 2010 through the month preceding intervention onset) were defined as the pre-intervention period. The post-intervention period served as the point of divergence in the time series. Monthly dummy variables were included in the model to account for seasonal shocks that may have occurred during specific periods of the year to show the impact of the site-specific strategies controlling for seasonal factors.

Interrupted time-series analyses were used to assess changes in official crime incident counts for four categories of crime: all crime incidents, assaults, disorderly offenses, and burglaries. The time-series analyses relied on generalized linear modeling count regression methods to estimate the site-specific impact of criminal incident counts. Models for each outcome were estimated using a log-linear Poisson distribution, unless the sample variance was significantly greater than the sample mean (i.e., an overdispersed distribution), in which case negative binomial regression was used. Each regression was location specific and was uniquely modeled for the target areas (Savanna Landing), and the comparison area (the remainder of the Riverside Police Division served as the comparison area). No subgroup analysis was conducted.

Study 2

Corsaro and Engel (2020b) also conducted an interrupted time-series analysis with a comparison condition to assess the impact of the Tulsa CBCR Initiative on crime counts at the Kwick Stop location at an 18-month post-intervention period. The methods were the same as described in Study 1 (Corsaro and Engel, 2020a).

As part of the CBCR Initiative, the Tulsa Police Department added security checks and patrol allocation at the Kwick Stop and identified problems beyond loitering or gathering, including harassment of residents shopping at the store and likely drug sales. In July 2018, the city of Tulsa passed the Tulsa Chronic Nuisance Abatement Property Ordinance, which provided the Tulsa Police Department, city officials, and a steering committee a potential leverage mechanism that could be used to promote crime prevention approaches at the Kwick Stop site. As a result, for the Kwick Stop time-series models, August 2018 served as the post-intervention period because it reflected the first month of the Nuisance Abatement mandate.

The analysis was the same as described in Study 1 above to assess the changes in all crime incidents, assaults, and disorderly offenses at the Kwick Stop during the 18-month post-intervention period, relative to changes in crime in the comparison area. No subgroup analysis was conducted.

These sources were used in the development of the program profile:

These sources were used in the development of the program profile:

Following are CrimeSolutions-rated programs that are related to this practice:

Hot Spots Policing

Hot spots policing strategies focus on small geographic areas or places, usually in urban settings, where crime is concentrated. Through hot spots policing strategies, law enforcement agencies can focus limited resources in areas where crime is most likely to occur. This practice is rated Effective for reducing overall crime and rated Promising for reducing violent, property, public order, and drug and alcohol offenses.

Evidence Ratings for Outcomes

	Crime & Delinquency - Multiple crime/offense types
	Crime & Delinquency - Violent offenses
	Crime & Delinquency - Property offenses
	Crime & Delinquency - Public order offenses
	Crime & Delinquency - Drug and alcohol offenses

Why might a practice's outcome ratings differ from the ratings of specific programs encompassed by that practice?