The Little Village Gang Violence Reduction Project in Chicago

community?” Respondents were asked to identify up to five problems and rank them in order ofseriousness.Respondents in both communities most often mentioned gangs as a problem, both atTime I and Time II. Pilsen respondents were more likely to do so at both time periods. Giventhat respondents were aware of the purpose of the survey – to get some sense of the seriousnessof the gang problem in the community – it is perhaps not surprising that this should have beenthe most common response. Nonetheless, there was a statistically significant decrease inmentioning gangs as a community problem in both communities (from 80.2% to 64.9% in LittleVillage, Chisquare = 5.604, df = 1, p # 0.05; and from 92.8% to 73.7% in Pilsen, Chisquare =12.605, df = 1, p # 0.001).General crime and safety-related issues 3 were the next most frequently mentionedproblems at both time periods, significantly more so by Little Village respondents. Other areasof concern, in both communities at both time periods, included drugs and lack of social services.Alcohol-related problems were of moderate importance: for residents of Little Village, theywere mentioned significantly more often at Time I than at Time II (18.7% at Time I versus 6.7%atTime II; Chisquare = 6.582, df = 1, p # 0.01), while the opposite trend existed in Pilsen – anincrease from 7.2% at Time I to 16.8% at Time II (Chisquare = 4.217, df = 1, p # 0.05). Pilsenrespondents were significantly more likely than Little Village respondents to mentioneducational problems at Time I (16.5% versus 4.2%; Chisquare = 7.894, df = 1, p # 0.01), but3 Responses in this category included answers such as “graffiti,” “gun shots,” “police harassment,” “toomuch violence in the area,” and “lack of police protection.”16.7