[Community_garden] do gardens reduce crime?

[Cynthia Price]

A while back someone named Katherine Alaimo studied community gardens in
Flint, Michigan. I've talked with her a few times and we had her present at
one of our conferences. She intended to study nutritional aspects of CGs but
after talking with the gardening folks wound up instead studying how
"tensions eased" when communities got together to garden (and as I recall,
voter registration increased). It doesn't really have so much to do with the
individual demeanors of the gardeners; it has to do with the benefits of
getting together to work towards a peaceful common goal. I've looked all
over for such studies, and I think her stuff is the closest I've found to an
academic study on the subject.
I'm not sure the link below will work but it's an article not so much about
what she found out but about community-based research and scholarship. I
know the actual study exists but I've never actually gotten my hands on it.
But anyway, if the link doesn't work, googling Katherine Alaimo community
gardens brings up several entries.

I believe there is more out there, because at one point the City of Grand
Rapids was hiring these sort of neighborhood crime prevention specialists,
and community gardens was one of their tools -- when I asked one of them
about it, she said they had had access to information indicating CGs do
decrease crime, but I didn't have a chance to follow up. I think it's a
fascinating subject.

Cynthia Price
Greater Grand Rapids Food Systems Council
Co-chair, Urban Ag Committee of Community Food Security Coalition

www.wkkf.org/default.aspx?tabid=55& CID=377&ProjCID=377&ProjID=59&NID=28



On Fri, Mar 7, 2008 at 3:26 PM, Diana Liu <diana1127 at sbcglobal.net> wrote:

> I don't know about academic studies, but probably in some sociology or
> psychology studies.  However, I think that it needs to be made clear that
> gardens don't reduce crime.  People reduce crime.  Then it's about how we
> make tha connection.  Are people who garden more peaceful and less violent?
>  May be you might find something along that hypothesis.
>
> Miriam Avins <mavins at erols.com> wrote:  Hi, everyone,
>
> I'm working on a paper about Baltimore's need for a land trust for
> community-managed open space. Can any of you help me find academic
> studies of how community gardens (and other open spaces managed by
> communities) reduce crime and other social ills? I've seen plenty of
> studies on the general topic of greening and a reduction in social
> ills, but nothing specific to community gardens. Can any of you wise
> folks give me a reference?
>
> Thank you so much!
>
> regards,
>
> Miriam
>
> Miriam Avins
> Homestead Harvest Community Garden
> and Baltimore Green Space
>
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