When friends visit, they always comment on the attractiveness of downtown Bozeman. It’s really a gem. Downtown property owners and the City of Bozeman are trying to raise awareness to an increase in “petty” crimes. Perhaps they can motivate people in the same manner that the Gallatin Valley Human Rights Task Force did when a member of the National Alliance, a white supremacist group, ran for the Bozeman school board. Their vocal effort to condemn the Alliance’s racist message clearly expressed our community’s values. I suggest we send the same message to vandals and criminals. Here’s why.

Ignoring petty criminal behavior signals a tolerance for social disorder. Honest people react by either withdrawing into their homes or moving to safety. This loss of human capital has an insidious cascading effect, as grocery stores, retail shops, and banks soon abandon unsafe areas.

While academics are often stereotyped as Ivory Tower intellectuals, sometimes their ideas improve the “real” world. James Q. Wilson, one of America’s most respected policy analysts, is an example. For nearly 30 years, he taught at Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government, and he’s lectured in our program for federal judges. In 1982, he coauthored a piece with George Kelling in The Atlantic. Their article, “Broken Windows: The police and neighborhood safety,” fundamentally changed the approach to crime prevention. Here’s a summary.

Kelling and Wilson observed high-crime neighborhoods in Newark, New Jersey. They noticed that the presence of stripped cars, vagrants, and graffitied walls signaled decay in social control. Using the metaphor of a broken window, they wrote, “…one un-repaired broken window is a signal that no one cares…if…not promptly fixed, more windows would be broken.” They suggested petty crimes, such as window breaking, would lead to an increase in more serious ones.

Kelling and Wilson suggested restoring social order by cracking down on “minor” offenses like turnstile jumping and loitering. On the way to a New York Mets baseball game when I was a kid, “squeegee boys” surrounded our car at a red light and, uninvited, “washed” our windshield. Failure to pay meant a ruined paint job—at least. It was terrifying.

Kelling and Wilson hypothesized that fear, created by such public disorder, leads to weakened social controls. This creates the conditions in which crime can flourish. They wrote:

“It’s the level of disorder that counts as much as crime. And therefore, we urge the police to pay as much attention to…the elimination of public disorder, by getting rid of prostitutes and gangs on street corners, by painting out the graffiti, by making people feel comfortable around their homes….”

Kelling and Wilson proposed neighborhood policing by officers on foot, rather than in cars. Once out of their cars, officers interacted with residents, building trust and reducing tensions. The police presence sent the message that public order and civility would be maintained. (Don’t you feel better when you see Bozeman’s bicycle cops riding through Sweet Pea’s big crowds?)

In the mid 1990s, New York’s Mayor Rudy Giuliani put the broken windows theory into practice. Giuliani promised to restore the city’s quality of life. He succeeded. Under his tenure, violent crime was cut in half and the murder rate went down 70 percent. Critics argued that this approach results in the “criminalization of poverty.” This is the sort of naive comment that gives social workers a bad name.

A pleasant and safe civic environment is something to cherish and foster. The Downtown Association’s efforts to beautify Main Street and Bozeman’s Sweet Pea Festival of the Arts are but two of the many expressions of our civic pride and values. (The construction workers who “took care of business” when a druggie tried to hold up their favorite watering hole is another.)

Not all citizens are equipped, either physically or mentally, to engage in such direct action. But they can still help. The City of Bozeman asks that you call 911 if you witness a crime or an act of vandalism. In addition, the Bozeman Police Department can be reached at 582-2000 and Crimestoppers at 586-1131. Our community is surely worth the effort.