Study on violence coming soon

Student voices will be included in the report for the Mayor's Roundtable on Violence. (Nick Pearce Photo)

For months, there have been news stories coming out at least once a week, with headlines like “Study on Violence Coming Soon.”

Renowned criminologist Donald Clairmont is feeling the pressure. The Dalhousie professor aims to put the hotly anticipated report of the Mayor’s Roundtable on Violence in Mayor Peter Kelly’s hands next month.

“It takes a hell of a long while to compile all this together,” says Dr. Clairmont, director of the Atlantic Institute of Criminology at Dalhousie and professor in the Department of Sociology and Social Anthropology.  He explains he’s solely responsible for compiling the reams of data that have been collected into a comprehensive report.

“It’s a lot of pressure, because obviously people would like the report out sooner than later, but you’ve got to weigh that against the scale of the operation. And thankfully, we are nearing the end.”

Mayor Kelly announced the roundtable in November 2006 to confront issues of violence and perceptions of violence in HRM. It was launched in response to a number of incidents in the city’s downtown, most notably the stabbing of an American soldier in a local bar. With his extensive experience evaluating restorative justice, sentencing and the court system, Dr. Clairmont was approached by the mayor to facilitate the roundtable and collect HRM-specific data that could inform municipal policy.

“HRM is really quite distinct from the rest of the province,” he says. “Its population is growing, not declining. Its crime patterns are quite different than in the rest of the province. The economic conditions are different – we have a huge student population, one of the highest proportions of people between 18 and 30 in the country, whereas outside HRM the population is aging rapidly.”

Donald Clairmont

These unique qualities require different approaches and sound research to inform them, which is why Dr. Clairmont’s roundtable has embarked on some of the most extensive research ever conducted on crime in Halifax.

“We’ve conducted three large public surveys of a representative sample of 1,200 on the telephone, another representative sample of mail-back surveys of almost 2,000 people, and a survey of almost 1,600 students in the HRM area done in collaboration with the Halifax Student Alliance,” says Dr. Clairmont. “So just from the point of view of public surveys, these are massive projects. As a matter of fact, no other roundtable or city assessment in the country has done anything near this depth – and the surveys are just one part of what we’re doing.”

Dr. Clairmont explains each component of the roundtable process was designed to solicit feedback from different actors in the Halifax arena. While the surveys gathered representative public opinion, seven focus groups were held to gather the views of local community leaders and engaged participants on topics such as troubled youth, street crime and the downtown bar scene. Public meetings were held in the six community council regions of HRM to engage local activists and community members. Finally, last November, Dr. Clairmont chaired a three-day, fully telecasted roundtable session where local experts and authorities, such as parole officers or youth social workers, could explain what’s going on in their field.

To demonstrate the scope of the work, Dr. Clairmont focused in on one component: the student survey done with the assistance of the Halifax Student Alliance. A municipal lobby group formed by five student associations in the city, the alliance conducted an online survey asking students about their perceptions and personal experience with crime in the city. Dr. Clairmont’s report on this survey – which will be made available as an appendix when the final report is complete – analyzes and compares students with adults, international students to those from other parts of Nova Scotia, and provides an unprecedented look at how students cope or adopt strategies to avoid crime.

That’s just one piece of the puzzle – and it’s 38 pages long.

“When the mayor asked me if we would do (the roundtable), I think he initially thought of a more modest project,” says Dr. Clairmont. “But I have a bit of a reputation in academia for being very thorough, and I certainly didn’t want to be in a position where I would just bounce off a couple of recommendations based on a superficial look at the situation. I don’t feel comfortable doing that. Any recommendations we make affect a lot of different human beings, so it’s very crucial to me that we had a very solid project. And the mayor agreed.”

Dr. Clairmont estimates that since he began working on the project in earnest in May 2007, he’s chalked up 40 hours a week on the project, mostly during evenings and weekends.

“We did an awful lot of work,” he reflects. “I hope that by making all our data available that the project will have an important legacy. The public may or may not want to read through all the data, but I hope people read the report itself, appreciate the effort that went into it, and that they encourage their leadership to act on some of the recommendations.”