I wish I paid attention sooner, because I don't know when it happened, but for a while there in say 1998-2004 it looked like the "bad" neighborhoods were getting better, some money was getting spent on cleaning up, putting up playgrounds, curfews, neighborhood watches, camera systems, more police, ect then with in a few years it went in reverse. I do some work in Providence {one of our cities} and see the changes, its turning into Gotham city as of late. less and less police, more and more people just "hanging" around, more and more murders on the news, ect...
Its not hard to clean up a neighborhood, install camera systems {private and public} give private property owners incentives to install cameras, make patrols more frequent, instead of the cops sitting parked watching cars drive by well lit main streets, have them on constant patrol, driving up and down each street in random patterns {oxymoron I know}, have more gun trade ins, have "safe" places for children, installing a playground does a lot to a neighborhood around here we have stricter laws when in the area of a school or playground, so you get caught with an illegal gun or drugs within 500ft, you are going to jail, don't pass go don't collect $200 you go to jail, sex offenders cant be around them, more good people outside watching the kids vs scum hanging out looking for trouble... Have paid tipster programs, you snitch on someone selling or buying drugs in your area and you get money a stupid $50 visa card will get most of these people the incentive to clean their streets, rite now they think "what am I getting out of it" well heres $50 for a simple phone call that leads to a conviction, more people will call... Curfews, no one outside hanging around after 11pm, you better be inside or going to work, after a while it will be a lot harder for people to do bad things when there is no where to do them... Make littering fines $1000 and up, you treat the land like a dump and it will cost you $1000, after a while it will get cleaned up.
They can do so many things to clean up the "bad" areas and then the youth will have some respect for life and living, turn these inner cities from prison waiting rooms into places people can live like people, not animals, you live like a wild animal then you are going to act that way....
We can talk about it until we pass out, but nothing is going to change, I fear its too far gone... I know I go for walks with my kids and bring a trash bag, we pick up any garbage we see on the walks, I have them volunteer their time to the community, through church and the fire station they learn that helping people feels good... A women about a 1/2 mile from us lost her husband 2 years ago, my son rides his bike there and cuts her grass, we drive by and pick up her trash when we take ours to the transfer station {no public trash pickup here}, her neighbor {also older} takes her shopping. The local library needed a roof and the budget wasn't there to replace it, we had fundraisers and paid the balance, there are neighboring towns that couldn't afford their football program we had fundraisers to save them and reworked the zoning so the kids all had the chance to play and stay out of trouble.. Its a community, but more important it is where our home is.... Not perfect by any means but we don't have murders, very few police calls, we try to make sure all the graduating kids have plans, we do our best to prevent teen pregnancy {with education and free protection}, ect... I know there are a lot more people in the inner cities and I honestly wouldn't have all the answers, but I know the first place to start is with the parents, showing them how teaching their kids to be productive vs destructive is better for them and everyone else... So much violence, larceny, ect I think I would just move away before trying to change it...
I think it all boils down to SOME PEOPLE ARE JUST SCUM, and they will continue to raise kids that follow suit, and they will do the same, their numbers will climb, they will take over neighborhood by neighborhood until we have to all move to lillyhammer...