San Jose Strong Neighborhoods Initiative

For decades, San Jose has been one of the most innovative cities in the country. While they've got many of the same challenges as most big cities, they've done a better job than most at working on solutions that actually create long term positive change. It is no coincidence that San Jose is one of the safest big cities in the country.

Back in the 1990s, San Jose was faced with an increase in gang and drug problems, like most cities, they put an emphasis on increased law enforcement. However, unlike most cities, they realized that addressing the crime wasn't enough. You can't materially change a situation unless you also look at the underlying issues that have caused the problem in the first place.

While others cities continued to add additional police officers (at considerable expense), San Jose began to look at all the other resources in the community and realized that while police are still the primary element in reducing crime, every city department and every citizen needed to play a role in reducing crime in the community. Thus, San Jose has far fewer Police officers per capita than most similar sized cities---and a low crime rate to boot!

I'll be talking more about the San Jose model in future blogs. While every city is unique, we can learn a lot from the San Jose experience that can be applied in Manteca and many other communties.

I've attached a business plan that was created for their Strong Neighborhoods Initiative--which is the driving force behind San Jose's focus on tapping the strengths of all of city staff and all of the community in improving the city's quality of life.

SNIBusinessPlanVersion7C.pdf