“Community Safety” has become a hot topic in NYC.  The NYPD claims this is the motivation behind its of “proactive” policies and practices, while opponents of this approach have united in support of legislation called the “Community Safety Act,” which would require significant police reform.  Over the summer of 2013 we asked what community safety means to people that live, work, pray, and play in a NYC “hot spot,” a neighborhood where these policies and practices are lived on a daily basis. 

Alll around the Morris Avenue area we asked: What does Community Safety mean to you?  We displayed the messages on fences and walls around the neighborhood to facilitate conversation between neighbors, and will keep that conversation going on this page.  In the fall we’ll use this as a basis for a workshop on community safety that is aimed at informing a wide range of policy changes including but not limited to those related to policing. 

We analyzed the messages and developed the following seven categories for thinking about community safety:

1. Community Care – “A safe community is one that sticks together and creates a home”
2. Call for Education
3. Respect and Dignity – “Respect for all from all”
4. Community Voice
5. No Violence
6. Community Spaces – “A safe community has places we can be together”
7. Public Resources – A category that we saw missing in the data

The images below are the unsorted messages.