The Little Village Gang Violence Reduction Project in Chicago

changes and sixteen negative changes indicated statistical significance at p # 0.001). Similarly,the non-gang crime problem was viewed as less serious. At Time I, seventy-one youth saw it asserious or very serious, and fifty-three saw it as no problem or a little problem; at Time III, onlythirty-one saw it as a serious problem and ninety-three as a small or no problem (Sign test ofsixty-four positive changes, twenty negative changes: p # 0.001). Program youth sawneighborhood crime (gang or non-gang related) as significantly less serious at Time III. Theseperceptions were only partially consistent with those of the community residents (see Chapter16).At Time III, the youth perceived fewer gang activities in the neighborhood (Sign test, p =0.022) and they were less concerned about the possible victimization of a family memberthrough gang crime (Sign test, p = 0.021), although a majority considered there was still asubstantial amount of gang activity in Little Village. All of these changes suggested that whilethere remained considerable gang and non-gang criminal activity within the community, thesituation had improved. On the other hand, there was no statistically significant change inrespect to other gang crime-related characteristics of the community. Program youth were stillafraid of gang attacks and of walking alone in the neighborhood; they were not doing fewerthings to avoid gang crime.There was also no evidence that local institutions, community groups or adults generallyhad significantly affected the community’s gang problem. At Time III, youth did not think thepolice were doing more to deal with gang crime than they did at Time I, and local residents ororganizations were not perceived as doing much to help reduce gang crime. There was noperceived change in the activity of criminal adults who used gang youth as accomplices. There8.10