Crime Reduction - Helping to Reduce Crime in Your Area

Stage

Examples for youth diversionary project

Pre-implementation

These need to be SMART wherever possible.

To reduce the percentage of crime committed by young people in the area.

To provide supervised recreational activity for young people in the area.

To provide alternative developmental opportunities for young people.

Outputs are the things that need to be produced/done in order to achieve the desired objectives.

Project running each Wednesday and Saturday.

Publicity of the youth/football club in local schools.

Organised activities run for young people.

Steering group meetings held.

Training for volunteers.

Choose indicators that will show whether the project objectives and outputs are being achieved.

Ensure that the data required is available and easily collected.

State a starting baseline against which performance will be measured.

Number of young people regularly attending Project.

Number of young people using the leisure centre.

Number of regular volunteers recruited to the project.

Level of police recorded crimes committed by young people in target area.

Number of police incident data related to young people in target area.

Number of young people achieving certificates of achievement as shown in their project records of achievement.

Level of positive feedback from the community and participants.

Number of positive and negative press articles about area.

Include milestones for key activities of the project.

Include milestones for regular review of the inputs and outputs

For example:
Steering Group meeting to be held by (date)

Timetable trip schedule by (date)

Young People to be trained as sport coaches by (date)

This will enable analysis of the cost-effectiveness of the project.

Police time.

Volunteers time.

Use of the leisure centre.

Equipment and transport costs.

Publicity costs.

This will enable analysis of the cost-effectiveness of the project.

Calculate the costs of any police/criminal justice agency's responses to crimes/incidents where young people are involved as victims or perpetrators.

Calculate the costs of other local agency responses to youth crime/incidents, e.g. graffiti/vandalism clear ups etc

Comparing changes in the project area with what is happening in another areas is useful in helping to establish whether any changes are as a result of the project or could have happened anyway.

Identify a similar comparison area (in size and characteristics) not covered by the project.

Look at the wider area around the project for comparison.

Consider displacement and diffusion of benefits.

During the Project

Monitor inputs.

Monitor output and outcome data using the performance indicators identified.

Monitor key milestones.

Consider whether there is any core tracking data that does not relate directly to the inputs, milestones, outputs or outcomes that it may also be useful to collect and monitor.

Allow the results of the monitoring to dictate any changes to the ongoing implementation of the project.

Keep a record of the resources used in running the project, e.g. number of staff, who the staff are, how many hours staff work, costs incurred by the project.

For example:

Names of the young people attending and records of their attendance. (Aliases may be used if a young person is reluctant to give their name).

Addresses/postcodes of the young people.

Date of birth/age of the young people.

Any referrals to the project by other agencies.

The trips that individuals participate in.

Records of the individual young person's achievements.

Record any significant events that occur in each session.

Once a framework is established those running the project monitor the data and feedback the relevant information to the partnership.