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Tip : Communities Fix Up to Move Up
Posted: 3/9/08 :: By: Neil Erwin
Several local governments in North Louisiana, including Shreveport, Bossier Parish, Minden, and Ruston, are joining a national trend toward more aggressive enforcement of property standards ordinances. These efforts are aimed at eliminating neighborhood eyesores, from the removal of abandoned vehicles, to cutting weeds on neglected properties, to demolition of dilapidated structures. Shreveport's program memorably is called T.B.O.N.E., for Taking Back Our Neighborhoods Everyday.
Governmental mobilization for neighborhood fix up is a commendable, even essential, foundation for overall community advancement.
What might seem like small indicators of neighborhood apathy, such as broken windows in abandoned buildings, can start the downhill slide to neighborhood decay unless actively remedied. This "Broken-Window Theory" has been documented by public policy experts George Kelling and James Q. Wilson when they observed ". . . social psychologists and police officers tend to agree that if a window in a building is broken and is left unrepaired, all the rest of the windows will soon be broken." The signal is that no one cares. Wilson & Kelling, "Making Neighborhoods Safe," Atlantic Monthly, Feb., 1989.
The new active enforcement steps, incorporating condensed periods between notification and removal of inoperative vehicles, either voluntarily or by forced towing, are a welcome sign of civic vitality.
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