Pubdate: Thu, 08 Apr 2004 Source: Tri-Town Transcript (MA) Copyright: 2004, Tri-Town Transcript Contact: http://www.hiasys.com/contactus/contactus.html Website: http://www.townonline.com/boxford/news.html Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/2643 Author: Michael C. Levenson Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/dare.htm (D.A.R.E.) Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/raids.htm (Drug Raids) Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/topics/boot+camps Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/topics/scared+straight+programs ANTI-CRIME TECHNIQUES QUESTIONED The DARE program in schools, gun-buy-back programs, after-school sports and arts and dozens of other well-known crime-fighting techniques have not been proven effective, a Romney administration commission said on Monday, calling instead for dozens of new "cutting-edge" crime-fighting initiatives backed by scientific evidence. Among the dozens of recommendations by the Governor's Commission on Criminal Justice Innovation, encompassing urban crime, corrections, forensics, bureaucratic reform and police training, are mandatory post-release supervision for the 20,000 inmates who leave Massachusetts jails every year, the creation of a new state forensics lab, and a requirement that police officers obtain two-year associate's degrees. In the area of urban crime, the panel of 150 law enforcement officers, academics, social workers, legislators, and community leaders cited a study by the National Institute of Justice in asserting that some longstanding and high-profile crime-fighting initiatives "were not found to be effective in preventing crime." The initiatives questioned include: police visits to domestic abusers' homes days after an assault; peer counseling by students; Drug Abuse Resistance Education (DARE); after-school sports and arts; summer jobs and subsidized work programs for at-risk youth; neighborhood crime watches; arresting youths for minor offenses; prison boot camps and scared straight programs; and increased drug raids. The commission's charge was to conduct a top-to-bottom review of the state's criminal justice system and "leave no current practice unquestioned in searching for innovative solutions to our crime problems." "One of the most important points that I believe we make in this report is that you have to be extremely cold-blooded about how you invest in social programming," said Lt. Gov. Kerry Healey, a professional criminologist who chaired the commission. "Social programming should not be layered one on top of the other. If something doesn't work, you need to peel that funding away, or else your budget for this sort of thing will only ever grow." - --- MAP posted-by: Larry Seguin