Crime | Insight Maker

MODEL EXPLANATION:

This model simulates possible crime patterns among the youth population of Bourke, where levels of alienation, policing and community engagement expenditure can be manipulated. Here the youth in Bourke have a minimum percentage of interest to participate in community activities in which the government aims to improve their lifestyle and therefore reduce the rate of criminal activity. ASSUMPTIONS:There are 1500 youths of Bourke in the population susceptible to committing crime and simulations of criminal tendencies are only based the factors presented, no external influences.
VARIABLES:“Alienation” includes any factors that can increase the likelihood of youths to commit crime such as exposure to domestic violence, household income, education level, and family background‘Community engagement Expenditure’ is the total monies budgeted into community activities to develop youths in and out of Juvenile detention‘Policing’ is the amount of police placed onto patrol in the town of Bourke to reinforce safety and that the law is abided by. STOCKS:Conviction rate is set to 60%A juvenile detention sentence for convicted criminals is set to 3 monthsThe top 30% of the most severe offenders are sent to rehabilitation for 3 months, to which they return to Bourke, assumingly in a better state and less likely to repeat a petty crimeCommunity activities are set to last for 3 months to align with the seasons: these could be sporting clubs or youth groupsCommunity participants have a 20% chance of being disengaged as it may not align with their interestsInvestments into policing are felt immediately& community engagement expenditure has a delay of 3 months
INTERESTING FINDS:1. Alienation set to max (0.2), policing and community engagement set to minimum shows a simulation whereby all criminals are in town rather than being expedited and placed into juvenile detention, even after a base value of 200 youths placed into juvenile detention – this shows that budget is required to control the overwhelming number of criminal youths as they overrun Bourke2. Set community activity to 0.01, policing to max & Alienation to max. A lack of community activity can produce high disengagement amongst youths regardless of police enforcement to the town of Bourke that has a high criminal rate. Juvenile detention only lasts for so long and not all youths can be rehabilitated, so they are released back into Bourke with chances of re-committing crime. 3. Alienation plays a major role in affecting youths to consider committing crime. To keep criminal activity to a minimum, ideally the maximum rates of budget in policing and community engagement within youths highly at risk of committing crime should be pushed. Realistically, budget is a sensitive case within a small town and may not be practical. 4. Set policing to 0.25, community engagement to 0.2 & alienation to 0.04. Moderate expenditure to community activities and policing can produce high engagement rates and improved youths in the town of Bourke.

MGT563 (11605457) - Crime, Policing & Community Development in Bourke

Lisa Ma

5

Model Explanation:

This system dynamics model visualises the impact on investment into policing and community engagement resources on the crime rates within the youth population of Bourke, NSW.
The model also adds in the variable of funding for safe houses. With a high rate of domestic violence, unfavorable home conditions and other socio-economic factors, many youth roam the streets with no safe place to go, which may lead to negative behaviour patterns.

Assumptions

Youth Population: 700
Total youth population in 2016 for Bourke LGA was 646 (ages 10-29). (Census, 2016) Figures rounded to 700 for purposes of this model simulation.

Constants:
70% registration and engagement rates for Community funded programs
30% attendance rate for Safe Houses
50% crime conviction rate

Variables

Positive and Negative Influences

The model shows a number of key variables that lead youth to become more vunerable to commit a crime (such as alienation, coming from households with domestic violence, boredom and socio-economic disadvantages such as low income), as well as the variables that enhance the youth's likelihood to be a contributing member of the community (developing trusted relationships and connections with others, and having a sense of self worth, purpose and pride in the community). These factors (positive and negative) are aggregated to a single rate of 50% each for the purposes of the simulation, however each individual situation would be unique.

Police Funding / Resources

Police funding and resources means the number of active police officers attending to criminal activities, as well as prevention tactics and education programs to reduce negative behaviour. The slider can be moved to increase or decrease policing levels to view the impact on conviction rates. Current policing levels are approx 40 police to a population of under 3000 in Bourke.

Crime Rate

Youth crime rates in Australia were 3.33% (2016). Acknowledging Bourke crime rates are much higher than average, a crime rate of 40% is set initially for this model, but can be varied using the sliders.

Community Program Funding / Resources

Community Program Funding and Resources means money, facilities and people to develop and support the running of programs such as enhancing employability through mentorship and training, recreational sports and clubs, and volunteering opportunities to give back to the community. As engagement levels in the community programs increase, the levels of crime decrease. The slider can be moved to increase or decrease funding levels to view the impact on youth registrations into the community programs.

Observations

Ideally the simulations should show that an increase in police funding reduces crime rates over time, allowing for more youth committing crimes to be convicted and subsequently rehabilitated, therefore decreasing the overall levels of youth at risk.

A portion of those youth still at risk will move to the youth not at risk category through increased funding of safe houses (allowing a space for them to get out of the negative behaviour loop and away), whom them may consider registering into the community engagement programs. An increase in funding in community engagement programs will see more youth become more constructive members of the community, and that may in turn encourage youth at risk to seek out these programs as well by way of social and sub-cultural influences.

Clone of Justice & Community Support Investment and the Impacts on Bourke Youth Population

Hamza Razi

Bourke is a town of 3000 people in the North West of New South Wales about, 800km from Sydney. Bourke has an issue with high incarceration rates amongst the youth. This model looks into how the crime rates amongst the Youth change over time depending on three key variables.

Variables

The three variables are as follows

Support Network: This relates to relationship with family, other community members and school attendance.
Community Involvement: This relates to the community development programs such as sporting clubs and other social clubs.
Police Presence: This relates to the presence of police in the community such as the number of patrol cars and also the degree the police are involved in community relations

The scale for the variables is as follows that

1= No Support Network, Community Involvement or Police Presence

5= A Supportive network is present, Involvement within the community is good or there is suitable police presence

10: Incredibly positive Supportive network, very active with community programs and police presence is great.

Assumptions

-In this model we assume that Youth will be imprisoned for 6 months and released back into the community.

-That from the youth that commit Petty Crimes 25% will go on to be convicted and go to jail while the reminder 75% will become Youth at Risks once again.

Notes

-The observations for this model are heavily dependant on the level of each variable. Generally it has been observed that the higher the level of the variables the less we see Youth in the Bourke Community misbehaving.

-It has been observed that if Bourke is to have at least each variable at a level of 7 and above the number of behaving Bourke Youth will increase while Youth at Risk, Petty Crimes and Jailed Youth will decrease.

Interrelations

Police Presence

The level of police presence will influence the Number of youth at risk, petty crime levels,number of youth that are jailed and also the likely hood youth at risk are to change their attitude and become positive members of the community.

Support Network and Community Involvement

A like to police presence the higher the level for these variables the less the numbers for Youth at Risk, Petty Crime, Jailed will be observed. In addition these variables will have a big impact on the likely hood of a previously jailed youth re-offending.

Initial Values

Bourke Youth:800

Youth at risk:300

Petty Crime-:100

Jailed:100

Bourke Youth - 44619472

LeeRoy Chitambira

Model Explanation:

This system dynamics model visualises the impact on investment into policing and community engagement resources on the crime rates within the youth population of Bourke, NSW.
The model also adds in the variable of funding for safe houses. With a high rate of domestic violence, unfavorable home conditions and other socio-economic factors, many youth roam the streets with no safe place to go, which may lead to negative behaviour patterns.

Assumptions

Youth Population: 700
Total youth population in 2016 for Bourke LGA was 646 (ages 10-29). (Census, 2016) Figures rounded to 700 for purposes of this model simulation.

Constants:
70% registration and engagement rates for Community funded programs
30% attendance rate for Safe Houses
50% crime conviction rate

Variables

Positive and Negative Influences

The model shows a number of key variables that lead youth to become more vunerable to commit a crime (such as alienation, coming from households with domestic violence, boredom and socio-economic disadvantages such as low income), as well as the variables that enhance the youth's likelihood to be a contributing member of the community (developing trusted relationships and connections with others, and having a sense of self worth, purpose and pride in the community). These factors (positive and negative) are aggregated to a single rate of 50% each for the purposes of the simulation, however each individual situation would be unique.

Police Funding / Resources

Police funding and resources means the number of active police officers attending to criminal activities, as well as prevention tactics and education programs to reduce negative behaviour. The slider can be moved to increase or decrease policing levels to view the impact on conviction rates. Current policing levels are approx 40 police to a population of under 3000 in Bourke.

Crime Rate

Youth crime rates in Australia were 3.33% (2016). Acknowledging Bourke crime rates are much higher than average, a crime rate of 40% is set initially for this model, but can be varied using the sliders.

Community Program Funding / Resources

Community Program Funding and Resources means money, facilities and people to develop and support the running of programs such as enhancing employability through mentorship and training, recreational sports and clubs, and volunteering opportunities to give back to the community. As engagement levels in the community programs increase, the levels of crime decrease. The slider can be moved to increase or decrease funding levels to view the impact on youth registrations into the community programs.

Observations

Ideally the simulations should show that an increase in police funding reduces crime rates over time, allowing for more youth committing crimes to be convicted and subsequently rehabilitated, therefore decreasing the overall levels of youth at risk.

A portion of those youth still at risk will move to the youth not at risk category through increased funding of safe houses (allowing a space for them to get out of the negative behaviour loop and away), whom them may consider registering into the community engagement programs. An increase in funding in community engagement programs will see more youth become more constructive members of the community, and that may in turn encourage youth at risk to seek out these programs as well by way of social and sub-cultural influences.

Clone of Justice & Community Support Investment and the Impacts on Bourke Youth Population

Hamza Razi

HOW A NEW COMMUNITY ENGAGEMENT INITATIVE MAY IMPACT YOUTH CRIME IN THE TOWN OF BOURKE, NSW

MKT563 Assessment 4: Kari Steele

Aim of Simulation:

Bourke is a town in which Youth are involved in high rates of criminal behaviour (Thompson, 2016). This simulation focuses on how implementation of a community engagement initiative may impact crime patterns of youths in Bourke. The specific aim is to assess whether the town should initiate a program such as the Big Brothers Big Sisters Community-Based Mentoring (CBM) (Blueprints for Healthy Youth Development, 2018) program to reduce crime and antisocial behaviour (National Institute of Justice, n.d). Big Brothers Big Sisters is a community mentoring program which matches a volunteer adult mentor to an at-risk child or adolescent to delay or reduce antisocial behaviours; improve academic success, attitudes and behaviours, peer and family relationships; strength self-concept; and provide social and cultural enrichment (Blueprints for Healthy Youth Development, 2018).

Model Explanation:

An InsightMaker model is used to simulate the influence of Big Brothers Big Sisters Initiative on Criminal Behaviour (leading to 60% juvenile detention rates) with variables including participation rate and also drug and alcohol use.

Assumptions:

1/ ‘Youth’ are defined, for statistical purposes, as those persons between the ages of 15 and 24 (United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs, n.d).

2/ Youth population (15 – 24 years) makes up 14.1% of the total population of LGA Bourke which according to the most up-to-date freely available Census data (2008) is 3091 (Australian Bureau of Statistics, 2010). Therefore, youth population has been calculated as 435 individuals.

3/ Big Brothers Big Sisters Program is assumed to impact LGA Bourke in a similar manner that has been shown in previous studies (Tierney, Grossman, and Resch, 2000) where initiative showed mentored youths in the program were 46% significantly less likely to initiate drug use and 27 percent less likely to initiate alcohol use, compared to control. They were 32 less likely to have struct someone during the previous 12 months. Compared to control group, the mentored youths earned higher grades, skipped fewer classes and fewer days of school and felt more competent about doing their schoolwork (non-significant). Research also found that mentored youths, compared with control counterparts, displayed significantly better relationships with parents. Emotional support among peers was higher than controls.

Initial Values:

Youth Population = 435

Criminal Behaviour = 100

40% of youth population who commit a crime are non-convicted

60% of youth population who commit a crime are convicted

20% of youth involved in the Big Brothers Big Sisters Initiative are non-engaged

80% of youth involved in the Big Brothers Big Sisters Initiative are engaged

Variables:

The variables include ‘Participation Rate’ and ‘Drug and Alcohol Usage’. These variables can be adjusted as these levels may be able to be impacted by other initiatives which the community can assess for introduction; these variables may also change in terms of rate over time.

Interesting Parameters

As can be seen by increasing the rate of participation to 90% we can see juvenile detention rate decreases with engagement (even with the 20% non-engagement of youths involved in program). By moving the slider to 10% participation however you can see the criminal behaviour increase.

Conclusion:

From the simulation, we can clearly see that the community of Bourke would benefit in terms of the Big Brothers Big Sisters Initiative decreasing criminal behaviour in youths (15 – 24 years of age) over a 5-year timeframe. Further investigation regarding expenditure and logistics to implement such a program is warranted based on the simulation of impact.

References:

Australian Bureau of Statistics. (2010). Census Data for Bourke LGA. Retrieved from www.abs.gov.au/AUSSTATS/abs@.nsf/Previousproducts/LGA11150Population/People12002-2006?opendocument&tabname=Summary&prodno=LGA11150&issue=2002-2006

Blueprints for Healthy Youth Development. (2018). Big Brothers Big Sisters of America Blueprints Program Rating: Promising, viewed 26 May 2018, <www.blueprintsprograms.com/evaluation-abstract/big-brothers-big-sisters-of-america>

National Institute of Justice. (n.d.). Program Profile: Big Brothers Big Sisters (BBBS) Community-Based Mentoring (CBM) Program, viewed 26th May 2018, <https://www.crimesolutions.gov/ProgramDetails.aspx?ID=112>

Tierney, J.P., Grossman, J.B., and Resch, N.L. (2000). Making a Difference: An Impact Study of Big Brothers/Big Sisters. Philadelphia, Pa.: Public/Private Ventures.
http://ppv.issuelab.org/resource/making_a_difference_an_impact_study_of_big_brothersbig_sisters_re_issue_of_1995_study

Thompson, G. (2016) Backing Bourke: How a radical new approach is saving young people from a life of crime. Retrieved from < www.abc.net.au/news/2016-09-19/four-corners-bourkes-experiment-in-justice-reinvestment/7855114>

United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs (UNDESA). (n.d.). Definition of Youth, viewed 24th May 2018, www.un.org/esa/socdev/documents/youth/fact-sheets/youth-definition.pdf

Bourke Community Engagement Impact on Youth Detention

Kari Steele

Justice Reinvestment Program in Bourke NSW & Implications on Local Youth

Background

A small country town in NSW Australia, Bourke records very high youth crime rates and jail population, when compared to the remainder of the country. To tackle the specific causes for such high rates, a Justice Reinvestment Program has been designed, involving all actors of the local community (Police, Education, Local Elders, Community Members) and focusing on prevention rather than repression.

Model Explanation

This simple model aims at depicting patterns in crime and redemption behaviour; and how local actions, investments and resources can impact Bourke youth, positively or negatively. Multiple variables can be manipulated to assess results and outcomes.

Stocks

Youth Population – total youth population in the town of Bourke
Disengaged Youth – youth showing a Negative Behaviour. They have either left school, are affected by drug and/or alcohol consumption, and/or domestic violence. They need to be taken care of, otherwise they might engage in offences
Problem Youth – youth having committed an offence
Court Appearance – Problem Youth having been arrested, thanks to local police. Stock is affected by Police Budget variable
Jailed – youth having been convicted and sent to prison
Youth in Community Programs – youth population either out of prison and repenting; or Problem Youth enrolling in Community Activity
Engaged Youth – youth showing a Positive Behaviour. The final objective of this Justice Reinvestment program

Variables

School Attendance – a critical factor to re-engage Disengaged Youth
Crime Rate – percentage of Disengaged Youth committing offences
Police Budget – affects number of Problem Youth being brought to justice. Can be manipulated between 0 (absolutely no police in Bourke) to 100 (local police reinforcement and 24/7 surveillance), both being theoretical options
Reoffending Rate – percentage of Youth committing offences again, after their release from Jail
Community Programs Funding – amount spent on various community programs, such as training and apprenticeship; counselling; preventive police home visits; learner driver classes; sports; and cultural connections program. Funding impacts 3 types of Youth:

Disengaged Youth joining back community
Problem Youth entering Community Programs
Youth repenting after being released from Jail, and entering Community Programs

Assumptions

Bourke Youth Population = 1.000

Below coefficients and initial values were arbitrarily chosen but can be modified using sliders, to estimate influence and impact:

Crime rate in Disengaged Youth = 70%
Reoffending Rate = 30%
Police Budget = 40
Community Programs Funding = 60

Conclusions

There is no silver bullet solution to the youth crime problem in Bourke NSW. However, with the suggested combination of Police Budget and Community Program Funding, positive results appear from Year 3 onwards: even with the occasional spike of reoffenders and subsequent Problem Youth, overall Engaged Youth population increases, reaching 70% of total Youth Population on Year 4 and increasing.

Community Programs Funding has the biggest impact towards the program objective, as it helps creating positive reinforcement and life opportunities for Bourke youth at different disengagement stages.

Justice Reinvestment Program in Bourke NSW & Implications on Local Youth

Bernard Somja

Clone of Reoffending Scheme

Zane

About the Model

This model is designed to simulate the youth population in Bourke, specifically focusing on the number of criminals and incarcerated dependent on a few key variables.

Within the model, a young person living in Bourke can be classified as being in any of five states:

Young Community Member: The portion of the youth population that is not committing crime and will not commit crime in the future. Essentially the well behaved youths. A percentage of these youths will become alienated and at risk.

Alienated and At Risk Youths: The youths of Bourke that are on the path of becoming criminals, this could be caused by disruptive home lives, alcohol and drug problems, and peer pressure, among other things.

Criminal: The youths of Bourke who are committing crimes. Of these criminals a percentage will be caught and convicted and become imprisoned, while the remainder will either go back to being at risk and commit more crimes, or change their behaviour and go back to being a behaving community member.

Imprisoned: The youths of Bourke who are currently serving time in a juvenile detention centre. Half of the imprisoned are released every period at a delay of 6 months.

Released: Those youths that have been released from a detention centre. All released youths either rehabilitate and go back to being a community member or are likely to re-offend and become an alienated and at risk youth.

The variables used in the model are:

Police- This determines the police expenditure in Bourke, which relates to the number of police officers, the investment in surveillance methods and investment in criminal investigations. The level of expenditure effects how many youths are becoming criminals and how many are being caught. An increase in police expenditure causes an increase in imprisoned youths and a decrease in criminals.

Community Engagement Programs- The level of investment in community engagement programs that are targeted to keep youths in Bourke from becoming criminals. The programs include sporting facilities and clubs, educational seminars, mentoring programs and driving lessons. Increasing the expenditure in community engagement programs causes more young community members and less criminals and at risk youths.

Community Service Programs- The level of investment in community service programs that are provided for youths released from juvenile detention to help them rehabilitate and reintegrate back into the community. An increase in community service expenditure leads to more released prisoners going back into the community, rather than continuing to be at risk. Since community service programs are giving back to the community, the model also shows that an increase in expenditure causes a decrease in the amount of at risk youths.

All three of these variables are adjustable. The number of variables has been kept at three in order to ensure the simulation runs smoothly at all times without complicated outputs, limitations have also been set on how the variables can be adjusted as the simulation does not act the same out of these boundaries.

Key Assumptions:

The model does not account for the youths’ memory or learning.

There is no differentiation in the type of criminals and the sentences they serve. Realistically, not all crimes would justify juvenile detention and some crimes would actually have a longer than six-month sentence.

The constants within in the calculations of the model have been chosen arbitrarily and should be adjusted based on actual Bourke population data if this model were to be a realistic representation of Bourke’s population.

The model assumes that there are no other factors affecting youth crime and imprisonment in Bourke.

There are 1500 youths in Bourke. At the beginning of the simulation:

Young Community Member = 700

Alienated and At Risk Youth = 300

Criminal = 300

Imprisoned = 200

Noteworthy observations:

Raising Police expenditure has a very minimal effect on the number of at risk youths. This can be clearly seen by raising Police expenditure to the maximum of twenty and leaving the other two variables at a minimum. The number of Alienated and at Risk Youths is significantly higher than the other states.

Leaving Police expenditure at the minimum of one and increasing community development programs and community service programs to their maximum values shows that, in this model, crime can be decreased to nearly zero through community initiatives alone.

Leaving all the variables at the minimum position results in a relatively large amount of crime, a very low amount of imprisoned youth, and a very large proportion of the population alienated and at risk.

An ideal and more realistic simulation can be found by using the settings: Police = 12, Community Engagement Programs = 14, Community Service Programs = 10. This results in a large proportion of the population being young community members and relatively low amounts of criminals and imprisoned.

Clone of Bourke Justice Reinvestment - Nicholas Hayward 44553625

Sarah Herring

Bourke is a remote town approximately 650km from Sydney with a population of 2634. 28% of the population us made up of youths from 19 years old and younger. With a reputation of being one of the most dangerous towns in New South Wales.

To combat this, the Maranguka Justice Reinvestment Project was established to manage the situation with a goal of reducing youth crime through a serious of community projects including Early Years Transition (to prepare children for school) and Drive for Free, a program where volunteer police officers provide free driving lessons.

This model has been developed to demonstrate how youth alienation, police and community development interact with each other.

Assumption

The following assumptions have been made:

25% of youths between the ages 10 - 24 are engaged in criminal behaviour.

75% have positive engagement in society

Youth age group is from 5 years - 24 years

Youths have a 48% chance of not be rehabilitated and re-offending

Conclusion

It is evident, investment in early educational programs will have a positive impact on Youths within the township of Bourke. Attendance rates have grown from 86% to 92%. The provision of a strong educational program will contribute to breaking the cycle and result in more youths growing up to have a positive impact on society. Attendance rate for schools will improve and there will be an increase number of students who complete year 12 and transition to tertiary educations and/or employment.

Investment of personal time of members of the police force to teach youths how to drive, has not only provided the kids with an opportunity they wouldn't ordinarily have due to family circumstances, but also decrease the amount of vehicle related offences.

There is a correlation between the investment of time and money to provide the you members of Bourke's society with the right education and positive reinforcement with the reduction of criminal/negative behaviour.

Bibliography

NSW Bureau of Crime Statistics and Research. (2020). NSW Local Government Area excel crime tables.

Alexander, H. (2019, May 29). How NSW town labelled 'most dangerous in world' changed its destiny. Retrieved from Sydney Morning Herald: https://www.smh.com.au/national/nsw/how-nsw-town-labelled-most-dangerous-in-world-changed-its-destiny-20190527-p51ri6.html

Australian Bureau of Statistics. (2016). 2016 Census QuickStats. Retrieved from Australian Bureau of Statistics: https://quickstats.censusdata.abs.gov.au/census_services/getproduct/census/2016/quickstat/LGA11150?opendocument

Thompson, G., McGregor, L., & Davies, A. (2016, September 19). Backing Bourke: How a radical new approach is saving young people from a life of crime. Retrieved from ABC News: https://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-09-19/four-corners-bourkes-experiment-in-justice-reinvestment/7855114

Conceptual model of youth alienation, police and community develop in Bourke

Michaela Dwyer

An analysis of the impacts on youth outcomes in the town of Bourke.

The model

This model simulates the impact of factors including drug, alcohol, violence and abuse rates, police engagement rates, community funding and education rates on outcomes for youth in the town of Bourke.

Assumptions:

75% of youth are alienated

75% of alienated youth participate in crime

60% of imprisoned youth return to their previous behaviours

85% of those who participate in rehabilitation achieve better outcomes.

90% of those who participate in youth community programs achieve better outcomes

Variables:

Drugs, alcohol, violence and abuse rates - the percentage of youths who have been impacted by these factors. Adjusting this variable shows the impact on how many youths re-offend, and how many seek assistance to participate in community programs.

Police engagement rates - the percentage of instances in which police engage with youths. Adjusting this variable affects the number of youths participating in crimes who go on to be convicted and imprisoned - then leading to rehabilitation.

Community funding - the amount of funding dedicated to community initiatives. Adjusting this variable impacts the efficacy of community and rehabilitation programs.

Education participation rates - the percentage of youths participating in education. Adjusting this variable impacts the success rate of youths in achieving positive outcomes.

Re-offending rates - this is the rate at which offenders re-offend on release from prison. This is left at a steady rate of 60% of offenders to demonstrate the cyclical nature of offending.

Conclusion:

The simulation clearly shows that when rates of police engagement, community funding and education participation are high, the amount of youth achieving positive outcomes increases over time and the need for rehabilitation and juvenile community programs diminishes. Within 3.5 years, more youth are experiencing positive outcomes.

When community funding is eliminated and police engagement and education participation rates are reduced - there is a clear impact on the amount of alienated youth remaining high, demonstrating the importance of these factors.

Assignment 4 - Youth outcomes in Bourke

Kathryn Greensill

About the Model

This model is designed to simulate the youth population in Bourke, specifically focusing on the number of criminals and incarcerated dependent on a few key variables.

Within the model, a young person living in Bourke can be classified as being in any of five states:

Young Community Member: The portion of the youth population that is not committing crime and will not commit crime in the future. Essentially the well behaved youths. A percentage of these youths will become alienated and at risk.

Alienated and At Risk Youths: The youths of Bourke that are on the path of becoming criminals, this could be caused by disruptive home lives, alcohol and drug problems, and peer pressure, among other things.

Criminal: The youths of Bourke who are committing crimes. Of these criminals a percentage will be caught and convicted and become imprisoned, while the remainder will either go back to being at risk and commit more crimes, or change their behaviour and go back to being a behaving community member.

Imprisoned: The youths of Bourke who are currently serving time in a juvenile detention centre. Half of the imprisoned are released every period at a delay of 6 months.

Released: Those youths that have been released from a detention centre. All released youths either rehabilitate and go back to being a community member or are likely to re-offend and become an alienated and at risk youth.

The variables used in the model are:

Police- This determines the police expenditure in Bourke, which relates to the number of police officers, the investment in surveillance methods and investment in criminal investigations. The level of expenditure effects how many youths are becoming criminals and how many are being caught. An increase in police expenditure causes an increase in imprisoned youths and a decrease in criminals.

Community Engagement Programs- The level of investment in community engagement programs that are targeted to keep youths in Bourke from becoming criminals. The programs include sporting facilities and clubs, educational seminars, mentoring programs and driving lessons. Increasing the expenditure in community engagement programs causes more young community members and less criminals and at risk youths.

Community Service Programs- The level of investment in community service programs that are provided for youths released from juvenile detention to help them rehabilitate and reintegrate back into the community. An increase in community service expenditure leads to more released prisoners going back into the community, rather than continuing to be at risk. Since community service programs are giving back to the community, the model also shows that an increase in expenditure causes a decrease in the amount of at risk youths.

All three of these variables are adjustable. The number of variables has been kept at three in order to ensure the simulation runs smoothly at all times without complicated outputs, limitations have also been set on how the variables can be adjusted as the simulation does not act the same out of these boundaries.

Key Assumptions:

The model does not account for the youths’ memory or learning.

There is no differentiation in the type of criminals and the sentences they serve. Realistically, not all crimes would justify juvenile detention and some crimes would actually have a longer than six-month sentence.

The constants within in the calculations of the model have been chosen arbitrarily and should be adjusted based on actual Bourke population data if this model were to be a realistic representation of Bourke’s population.

The model assumes that there are no other factors affecting youth crime and imprisonment in Bourke.

There are 1500 youths in Bourke. At the beginning of the simulation:

Young Community Member = 700

Alienated and At Risk Youth = 300

Criminal = 300

Imprisoned = 200

Noteworthy observations:

Raising Police expenditure has a very minimal effect on the number of at risk youths. This can be clearly seen by raising Police expenditure to the maximum of twenty and leaving the other two variables at a minimum. The number of Alienated and at Risk Youths is significantly higher than the other states.

Leaving Police expenditure at the minimum of one and increasing community development programs and community service programs to their maximum values shows that, in this model, crime can be decreased to nearly zero through community initiatives alone.

Leaving all the variables at the minimum position results in a relatively large amount of crime, a very low amount of imprisoned youth, and a very large proportion of the population alienated and at risk.

An ideal and more realistic simulation can be found by using the settings: Police = 12, Community Engagement Programs = 14, Community Service Programs = 10. This results in a large proportion of the population being young community members and relatively low amounts of criminals and imprisoned.

Clone of Bourke Justice Reinvestment - Nicholas Hayward 44553625

Abdul Faheem Mohed

Youth Crime in Bourke

Bourke in NSW has an overall population of approximately 3000 people, and has an issue with crime - possibly due to the lack of activities available for young people to partake in.

This model shows how difference variables affect crime among youths in the town over a period of 48 months.

Assumptions

For the sake of this model, the number of youths is half of the total population (1500).

There is a maximum of 50 police available at anyone one time.

All youths in detention will eventually all be released back into the community.

Variables

The variables used to observe a difference in crime include the amount of Police working at any given time (can be adjusted between 10 and 50 police).

Community Funding is the other main variable in this model, as this is what the town would do to increase the amount of activities/resources available for youths to spend their time. This can be adjusted between 1 and 100 percent.

Crime Rate is a variable that is used in conjunction with the Police variable in order to help determine crimes committed by youths.

Rate Of Conviction is also used in conjunction with Police in order to help determine how many youths who have committed a crime will be convicted.

Observations

This model shows that over time, crime can be greatly reduced with more Police and more Community Funding. With the more of each being utilised have a proportional impact on the time it takes to do so. It seems eventually, those youths who have committed crimes will all end up being rehabilitated and eventually partaking in non-criminal activities.

- Bryce

Clone of Youth Crime In Bourke NSW

Bryce Hercok

Background

The town of Bourke is in north-west New South Wales and became the first pilot site to implement an Aboriginal-let model of justice reinvestment in 2013, known as the Maranguka Justice Reinvestment Project. The project aimed to demonstrate that sustainable outcomes can be achieved by redirecting funding to the underlying causes of youth crime.

Model explanation

This complex systems model depicts the relationships between different players and helps simulate youth crime patterns when influenced by funded community engagement activities, fluctuating levels of alienation, and police funding over a period of 2 years. The funding of community engagement activities aims to increase youth participation and therefore reduce the rate of criminal activity.

Assumptions

75% of Bourke’s youth are disengaged from society.

25% of Bourke’s youth are engaged with society.

50% of Bourke’s engaged youth are not interested in the community activities.

60% of disengaged youth are alienated.

Police expenditure: 30

Community engagement expenditure: 60

Stocks

Youth of Bourke
Total youth population in Bourke. We are assuming there are 500 youths susceptible to committing crime within Bourke.

Community activities
Community programs aimed at youths which could include sports, arts and cultural programs, counselling, support groups, learner driving school, school holiday programs and health and development checks.

Disengaged Youth
Youths who are not engaged in positive community activities and are at risk of committing criminal activities. These youths may be affected by domestic and family violence, drugs, alcohol or abuse.

Engaged Youth
Youths who are engaged in society in a positive way. The aim of this program is to have all youths positively engaged in Bourke’s community.

Crime
Youths who have committed a criminal offence.

Prison/detention
Youths who are found guilty of a criminal offence and are now in prison or detention.

Rehabilitation
Youths who have left prison/detention and are now attending rehabilitation programs. This rehabilitation should decrease the likelihood of youths re-offending.

Variables

Police expenditure
Funding for police presence to decrease the number of youths participating in criminal activities and whether they are convicted and imprisoned. If youths are imprisoned, police expenditure can also help move them towards rehabilitation to lessen the chance of re-offence.

Community engagement expenditure
Funding of community activities aimed at the youth of Bourke. These activities are designed to positively impact the lives of youth and lessen the chance of alienation and disengagement from the community.

Alienation
Contributing factors to alienation of youths in Bourke include domestic and family violence, drugs, alcohol, abuse, homelessness, and lack of education.

School/VET attendance
The rate at which Bourke’s youth attend school or vocational education and training courses (VET) to further their education and increase their engagement in the community.

Conclusions

This complex model indicates the impact of only a few variables, yet there are many more that can be considered. However, this model shows that over a period of 2 years, the combination of community engagement funding, police funding and education can improve the lives of Bourke’s susceptible youth. The most significant impact is made by the community engagement funding. If this funding is decreased, the rate of engaged youth decreases, and the rate of disengaged youth does not improve.

MKT563 Ass 4 - Complex systems - Justice Reinvestment Project in the town of Bourke

Renee Dickens

Background Information

Bourke is a town of 3000 people in the North West of New South Wales, about 750Km from Sydney.

The state government is implementing a new measure to prevent further crime committed by installing community programs such as sporting clubs, and classes to develop relationships among police and the community.

Many youth were going from home to juvenile detention and back, and many adults were on a similar roundabout between the community and jail.

Community development programs hopefully will reduce the levels of domestic violence among adults, and petty crime among the town’s youth.

Model Explanation

Firstly, you notice Adult and Youth population is separated and assumed that 50% of adults will commit crime whereas 20% in youth. A certain percentage is given for the number that is guilty and not guilty. Guilty, will receive certain punishment according to their age category and after their sentence is served, they go back to town.

Policing Expenditures shows how many officers are needed to reduce the amount of crime. Officers are called when a crime/mischief is committed, whether they're caught or not and found guilty or not.

Stocks

Adult Population: Adults in Bourke

Youth Population: Teenagers in Bourke

Crime: Domestic Violence/Homicide

Mischief: Petty Crimes

Jail: If Guilty, adults are sent to jail

Juvenile Detention: If guilty, youth are sent to detention

Community Programs: Sporting clubs, developing interpersonal relationships among police and “at risk” households, and teaching trade-skills

Assumptions

Adult Population: 2100

Youth Population: 900

Adult Crimes: 50%

Youth Mischief: 20%

Goal

The aim of this model is to illustrate the affects of implementing change i.e. policing/government aid within a community

Trends

The increase of Government Aid and Policing Expenditures decreases the crime performed in the community.

We can see a positive outcome from this and can take into account the affects of proper execution by the state government

44763514 Assignment 3 - Justice Reinvestment in Bourke

Kevin Chu

Youth community of Bourke

Youth Crime rate in Bourke

An educated assumption was made with the youth crime rate in Bourke. According to the ABS the youth crime rate of Australia is 14% in 2013-14. However, taking into consideration the poor standards of living and lack of education and care for youth in Bourke, it is expected that the youth crime will be more then double so the figure 40% was used in this model.

Model Explanation

This simple model starts off in town, with estimated 500 youth in the community. As said above 40% is expected to commit crime with a percentage of the crime population getting away not caught. This number depends on how many are caught and also how many police are out in the town. According to the "Boscar" (Bureau of Crime Statistics and Research) NSW's conviction rate is 85.7%. Even though the conviction is relatively high, Bourke's conviction rate was set at 60% due to the high level of crime against the number of police available.

In juvenile detention the expected number of youth is 120, with 50% of those being released. There is a delay of 6months during this process because whoever is convicted has to stay inside the juvenile detention for 6months before being released.

Those youths that does not commit crime has the choice to be a member of a sports team. These sports team has been funded by the community and the government through "Youth redevelopment Expenditure". This system allows teenagers in Bourke to be away from crime committing environment, hence reducing Youth crime rate in Bourke.

The two sliders "Police" and "Youth Redevelopment Expenditure" indicates the intensity of spending on these two subjects. The result of Bourke's crime rate and sports team engagement changes depending on these sliders.

Clone of MGMT220 Bourke Youth Community (Andrew Sohn 43661769)

Zaiceva Ekaterina

Brief Description of this Model

This model is design to stimulate the community in Bourke reflecting the involvement of police and community engagement to reduce alienation behavior, crime being committed which would lead to jail. With only 3000 members in the community, Bourke tops the charts of youth crime rates and domestic violence amongst adults which has accumulated cost of millions of dollars. A new approach has been propose to relocate of spending away from policing and justice system into community engagement which this model tries to demonstrate. Investment in communities represents investing in community worker.

Assumptions

Community workers are 80% successful in engaging of community.
Total elimination of pretty crime is not possible.

Initial Values - Members of Bourke Community

Home: 1000

Alienation: 120

Crime: 80

Jail: 200

Community: 500

Local Sport Clubs and Training Course: 100

Police

How this model works

The essences of this model is to dissolve the cycle of disengage community members from feeling alienated and being influence by antisocial activities, in which would likely lead to breaking the law and end up in jail. This model seeks to break the cycle by investing in policing and community workers running of community activities. The police involvement reduces crime rates and antisocial behavior. Engagement by community workers are also able to reduce antisocial.

A couple of program have reportedly been implement including of Operation Solidarity, were police officer follow up of victim's and perpetrator of domestic violence. Broadly represented by consultation/ rehabilitation in the model to include other services provided for alienated and previous offenders to resolve of issues and ease of reconnecting with community.

Antisocial activities is experience at home, local sports clubs and course training and community engagement. Such activities involve in abuse of drug and alcohol, and the effects of unemployment and boredom. Such activities is countered with engagement in community and local sports clubs and course, consultation / rehabilitation.

After consultation / rehabilitation, community members are reconnected with local sports club and from there to community engagement. Some would take time to reflect of their issues at Home, in which they would follow up consultation sessions or engage with community. However, like everyone at home, there is a possibility of expose to alienation and anti-social activities.

Community Engagement represents positive activities and connecting with the community. Idea for adults. The Local sports clubs and course training represents community activities for youth. Such activities have been implement such as the Muranguka Justice reinvestment Project were driving lessons and pre-school activities are offered for disadvantage kids.

Interesting Settings.

As assume not all criminal activities are prevented, therefore, jail would still contain a member of the public. However, graphs would indicate long-term that jails are rather empty.

Police : 99

Community Worker: 90

Justice Reinvestment Framework for Bourke

Siofilisi Latu Sikalu

Youth community of Bourke

Youth Crime rate in Bourke

An educated assumption was made with the youth crime rate in Bourke. According to the ABS the youth crime rate of Australia is 14% in 2013-14. However, taking into consideration the poor standards of living and lack of education and care for youth in Bourke, it is expected that the youth crime will be more then double so the figure 40% was used in this model.

Model Explanation

This simple model starts off in town, with estimated 500 youth in the community. As said above 40% is expected to commit crime with a percentage of the crime population getting away not caught. This number depends on how many are caught and also how many police are out in the town. According to the "Boscar" (Bureau of Crime Statistics and Research) NSW's conviction rate is 85.7%. Even though the conviction is relatively high, Bourke's conviction rate was set at 60% due to the high level of crime against the number of police available.

In juvenile detention the expected number of youth is 120, with 50% of those being released. There is a delay of 6months during this process because whoever is convicted has to stay inside the juvenile detention for 6months before being released.

Those youths that does not commit crime has the choice to be a member of a sports team. These sports team has been funded by the community and the government through "Youth redevelopment Expenditure". This system allows teenagers in Bourke to be away from crime committing environment, hence reducing Youth crime rate in Bourke.

The two sliders "Police" and "Youth Redevelopment Expenditure" indicates the intensity of spending on these two subjects. The result of Bourke's crime rate and sports team engagement changes depending on these sliders.

Clone of MGMT220 Bourke Youth Community (Andrew Sohn 43661769)

Laksh Taneja

Justice Reinvestment in Bourke

About/Background:

This model provides a simulation of the youth where it depicts the interactions and activities amongst the parameters in this situation. The town of Bourke have been dealing with the issue of a high crime rate amongst the young and many being locked up which as a result has shattered families. Now the government is deciding on how they would approach spending their money on and this model will depict the various solutions and give an indicator of how it effective it maybe.

Initial Values:

Home - 1000

Juvenile Detention - 0

Sporting Clubs - 0

Trade Skills - 0

Petty Crime - 0

Interpersonal Relationships - 0

Variables:

Youth Redevelopment Expenditure: The value that the state government are able to spend on trade skills and sporting clubs

Interpersonal skills: The rate at which how proficient a youth can be with their interpersonal relationships with others

Police: The number of police that are available in the town of Bourke

Rehab: A certain proportion of those that are in the juvenile detention, will be rehabilitated

Assumptions:

- The youth population (Home) will be 1000 (a third of the population of Bourke's 3000)

- When there is an increase of police it will result in an increase amount of youths being caught as well as a decrease in crimes being committed

- When someone goes to juvenile detention and understood their mistakes, when they are released they will no longer have the urge to commit a crime

- Youth Redevelopment Expenditure will affect participation rates and reduce crime rates

- Youth Redevelopment Expenditure is spread equally to sporting clubs and trade skills

- Youths that participate in sporting clubs, trade skills and Interpersonal relationships will be less likely to commit a crime

- Those in juvenile detention will be released after a period of 6 months where a proportion of them have been rehabilitated.

Interesting Results:

1. If all the sliders are set to half (Police - 30, Rehab - 50, Youth Redevelopment Expenditure - 50, Interpersonal Skill - 50), Sporting Club appears to be the most popular community development program for youths

2. If police and Youth Redevelopment are to its max and rehab and interpersonal are set to 0, there seems be a much lower rate of crime being committed as well as higher number of youths participating in sporting clubs

3. If police was to be at its lowest (10), youth redevelopment at 100, rehab and interpersonal skill at 50, crime appears to be low while maintaining high rate of youth participating in sporting clubs and trade skills.

Assignment 3 Visagan 44888104

Visagan Kajendran

Introduction

Bourke is a small town, located in New South Wales. The absence of a large number of entertainment negatively affects on a level of crime in town.

The model offers two options to increase the number of policemen to reduce the number of unresolved crimes, or to direct funds for the prevention of social problems and spend budget money on the development of sports clubs and educational programs(such as trading workshops).

Assumptions:

Bourke has a population of 3000 people, some of them commit crimes. Green are those variables that belong to the younger generation, respectively, orange marked variables that refer to the adult.

Since adults commit more serious crimes, violent character, then the variable refers to them (as well as a variable Jail). However, it is worth noting that such crimes are committed less often than minor crimes, so for the former to be added coefficient 0.05.

Variables:

Police presence: shows the amount of police in town

Engagement: the amount pf people, living in Bourke, who are engaged to take part in engagement activities.

Successful traders: The amount of traders, that are well known and successfully finished the course.

Number of successful athletes: The amount of successful athletes, who can serve as an example for young people to play sports.

(These two variables have not so significant effect on a correlation( such as first 2 variables), that is why, the are filled in a different colour(purple)).

Interesting Outcomes

The first simulation shows the correlation between

Despite of a large number of police officers (100), the number of domestic violence will still exceed the number of convicts. It could be said that not only police can not catch all the criminals, but also that not all victims submit an application to the police. For example, the do not want to disclose that.

The relationship between the involvement programs and the residents of Peter is much more ergonomic than the dependency between the number of policemen and the police's disclosure.

Therefore, it can be concluded that investing in engagement programs will do more good in a long-run than investing in prevention reforms.

Bourke Justice Reinvestment, Assignment 3, 44042590

Damir Malikov

Model Explanation:

This system dynamics model visualises the impact on investment into policing and community engagement resources on the crime rates within the youth population of Bourke, NSW.
The model also adds in the variable of funding for safe houses. With a high rate of domestic violence, unfavorable home conditions and other socio-economic factors, many youth roam the streets with no safe place to go, which may lead to negative behaviour patterns.

Assumptions

Youth Population: 700
Total youth population in 2016 for Bourke LGA was 646 (ages 10-29). (Census, 2016) Figures rounded to 700 for purposes of this model simulation.

Constants:
70% registration and engagement rates for Community funded programs
30% attendance rate for Safe Houses
50% crime conviction rate

Variables

Positive and Negative Influences

The model shows a number of key variables that lead youth to become more vunerable to commit a crime (such as alienation, coming from households with domestic violence, boredom and socio-economic disadvantages such as low income), as well as the variables that enhance the youth's likelihood to be a contributing member of the community (developing trusted relationships and connections with others, and having a sense of self worth, purpose and pride in the community). These factors (positive and negative) are aggregated to a single rate of 50% each for the purposes of the simulation, however each individual situation would be unique.

Police Funding / Resources

Police funding and resources means the number of active police officers attending to criminal activities, as well as prevention tactics and education programs to reduce negative behaviour. The slider can be moved to increase or decrease policing levels to view the impact on conviction rates. Current policing levels are approx 40 police to a population of under 3000 in Bourke.

Crime Rate

Youth crime rates in Australia were 3.33% (2016). Acknowledging Bourke crime rates are much higher than average, a crime rate of 40% is set initially for this model, but can be varied using the sliders.

Community Program Funding / Resources

Community Program Funding and Resources means money, facilities and people to develop and support the running of programs such as enhancing employability through mentorship and training, recreational sports and clubs, and volunteering opportunities to give back to the community. As engagement levels in the community programs increase, the levels of crime decrease. The slider can be moved to increase or decrease funding levels to view the impact on youth registrations into the community programs.

Observations

Ideally the simulations should show that an increase in police funding reduces crime rates over time, allowing for more youth committing crimes to be convicted and subsequently rehabilitated, therefore decreasing the overall levels of youth at risk.

A portion of those youth still at risk will move to the youth not at risk category through increased funding of safe houses (allowing a space for them to get out of the negative behaviour loop and away), whom them may consider registering into the community engagement programs. An increase in funding in community engagement programs will see more youth become more constructive members of the community, and that may in turn encourage youth at risk to seek out these programs as well by way of social and sub-cultural influences.

Clone of Justice & Community Support Investment and the Impacts on Bourke Youth Population

Hamza Razi

The complex systems model ‘Engagement vs Police Expenditure for Justice Reinvestment in Bourke, NSW’ evaluates the effectiveness of allocating government funding to either community engagement activities or law enforcement. In this model, it is possible for the user to designate resources from a scale of 20-100 and to also modify the crime rate for both adults and youth. Below, there are detailed notes that describe the reasoning and assumptions that justify the logic applied to this model. Similar notes can be found when stocks, flows and variables is clicked under the field ‘notes’.

Portions

Government statistics from the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) show that Bourke Shire Regional Council has approximately 3000 residents, made up of 65-63% adults and 35-37% youths.

Crime Rate

Police variable is in the denominator to create a hyperbolic trend. The aim was to achieve a lower crime rate if police expenditure was increased, thus also a higher crime rate if police expenditure was decreased. The figure in the numerator can be changed with the ‘maximum crime rate’ variable which represents the asymptotic crime rate percentage. Where police = 100 the selected crime rate is maximised.

Avoiding Gaol

Originally the formula incorporated the police as a variable, where the total amount of convicted crimes was subtracted from the total amount of crimes committed. However, the constant flow of crimes from repeat offender/a created an unrealistic fluctuation in the simulation. I settled for a constant avoidance rate of 25%. This assumes that an adult or youth committing a crime for the first time is just as likely to avoid conviction as a repeat offender.

Conviction

It is difficult to predict in a mathematical model how many adults or youths are convicted of crimes they commit. I determined a reasonable guess of maximum 75% conviction rate when Police = 100. In this formula, decreasing police spending equates into decreased conviction rate, which is considered a realistic representation.

Released

It is assumed that the average sentence for a youth is approximately 6 months detention. For an adult, it will be assumed that the average sentence is 12 months gaol. The discrepancy is due to a few basic considerations that include 1. Adults are more often involved in serious crime which carries a longer sentence 2. youths are convicted with shorter sentences for the same crime, in the hopes that they will have a higher probability of full rehabilitation.

Engagement

Rate of adult/youth engagement was estimated to be a linear relation. The maximum rate of engagement, assuming expenditure = 100, is set to 80%. This rate of engagement is a reasonable guess with consideration that there will also exist adults who refused to engage in the community and end up in crime, and adults or youth that refuse to engage in the community or crime.

Boredom

Engagement Expenditure variable is in the denominator to create a hyperbolic trend. The aim was to achieve a lower boredom rate with a higher engagement expenditure, and thus a higher boredom rate with a lower engagement expenditure. The figure in the numerator of 25 represents the asymptotic boredom rate percentage, where if engagement expenditure = 100 the adult/youth boredom rate is maximised at 25%.

Assessment #3 Justice Reinvestment in Bourke, NSW 44841396

Mark Robinson

Justice Reinvestment in Bourke

Model Explanation:

One part of this model is displaying the typical lifestyle of many adults and youth in the town Bourke, North West of New South Wales. This lifestyle involves committing crime, getting arrested for the crime by police (or getting away with it) and spending time in jail (for adults) or juvenile detention (for the youth) or simply getting discharged.

Additionally to this traditional lifestyle being modelled, an alternative option called community groups has also been incorporated into the model. The model is showing that members of Bourke have the option to join a community group which the government hopes will improve their lifestyle when they are immersed once again into society, thus reducing the rate of crime.

The Stocks Involved:

Adult- The adults living in Bourke
Youth- The adolescents living in Bourke
Petty Crime- The standard crime committed by the youth of Bourke. This can include stealing cars and breaking into property.
Crime- The common crime circulating among the adults of Bourke. This includes domestic violence often as a result of heavy drinking.
Apprehended- Youth getting captured by the police
Arrested- Adults getting caught by the police
Juvenile Detention- Alienation of youth by police
Jail- Adults locked up by the police
Community Group- Groups formed for the people of Bourke to join. Includes development activities, sporting clubs and trade-skill learning classes.
Positive Lifestyle- Adults and youth who have improved themselves as a result of joining these community groups (the goal of community engagement program expenditure).

The Variables Involved and How to Adjust Them:

1. Policing: The number of police in the town of Bourke. The level and amount of punishment is dependent on the quantity of police present.

Minimum amount is one as there should be at least one police existent.

2. Community Engagement Expenditure: The total amount of money spent into community groups to develop individuals.

The purpose of the government is to spend money on community engagement activities so the minimum is at least one percent of the money they have available to spend and the maximum is 100 percent of the money they can afford to spend.

--> Both variables have a slider that goes up and down by one step. You can adjust both variables at the same time but take into account both variables have their own minimum and maximum.

Underlying Assumptions:

-Approximately 3000 people in Bourke

-Coefficients and initial values are arbitrarily chosen. These would be modified with real-life data.

-The only external influences on this model are police and community investment.

Suggested Settings for Interesting Results:

1. First move the policing and community expenditure sliders to their maximum. Hit the simulate button and look at the first time-series graph titled 'Youth Lifestyle'. Notice the delays between increase of each stock and the ordering: As Youth decreases, Petty Crime will increase. Then youth Apprehended will begin to increase followed by those going to Juvenile Detention. Youth will then start to increase again and the trend continues over the 3-year period displayed. Notice how the same pattern occurs for the time-series graph labelled 'Adult Lifestyle'.

2. Move the policing slider to 1 and the community expenditure slider to 100. Hit simulate. Notice in the 'Youth Lifestyle' graph how even with community expenditure at its maximum, over time, Petty Crime will still increase because there are hardly any police and hence hardly any youth getting caught so as a result the youth in Bourke keep to their regular immoral lifestyle. If you view the 'Adult Lifestyle' graph you will see the same pattern. (Note this point is a main reason for the conclusion drawn below).

3. Move the community engagement and policing slider to their minimum 1. Hit simulate. View the third display titled 'Community Engagement Program'. You will notice how Youth and Adult decrease and Crime and Petty Crime increase. Also, since community engagement is at its minimum too (not just policing) the amount of people in Community Groups decreases significantly and as a result the number of individuals creating a Positive Lifestyle for themselves decreases too.

4. Move the Community Engagement Expenditure slider to 1 and the Policing slider to 50 and look particularly at the last display labelled 'Adults and Youth: Membership and Crime Rates'. You will notice instantly how Community Group and Positive Lifestyle always have a lower number of individuals compared to the general Youth and Adult stocks as well as the Crime and Petty Crime stocks. This gives indication that a higher amount of investment should be put into the community engagement programs for better results.

Conclusions:

A combination of policing and community engagement expenditure is the best solution for the people of Bourke as the policing will gradually reduce the amount of crime and the community development programs will help create a positive lifestyle for each individual that joins. Overall it is not efficient to just invest in community development programs. For the most effective outcome, an increase in policing is needed as well as investments in community engagement activities.

Note: You do not need to dive into any formulae. But feel free to move the sliders and hit that simulate button to view how the number of people in each stock changes based on the level of policing and community engagement expenditure!

Justice Reinvestment in Bourke - 44622554

Christine Fadly

4

Background:

The following model portrays the patterns of crime and community development in Bourke. Bourke is a town with exceptionally high rates of crime, especially within the youth population. The model created shows the methods taken to allow more community investment and more level of law enforcement (or the combination of both).

Underlying Assumptions:

Bourke total population: 2,973 (2014 ABS)

Bourke total youth population: approx 1000 (Based on 2014 ABS, individuals aged between 0-24 Which correlates to approximately 35.2% of the Total Population)

Budget: $4,000,000

Youth population has been sourced from: http://stat.abs.gov.au/itt/r.jsp?RegionSummary&region=11150&dataset=ABS_REGIONAL_LGA&geoconcept=REGION&datasetASGS=ABS_REGIONAL_ASGS&datasetLGA=ABS_REGIONAL_LGA&regionLGA=REGION&regionASGS=REGION

The Assumption of the model is that we begin with a population of young individuals who are neither criminal or non-criminal/committed the crime. Based on this idea, 250 of these individuals are currently incarcerated and 250 are currently committing crime though when simulated the model will illustrate how Law enforcement spending, community investment can impact Bourke's youth population.

Furthermore, after conducting some research, it can be concluded that based on several sources such as (https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/criminology-can-lack-education-linked-incarceration-nigel-wade) and (https://hilo.hawaii.edu/academics/hohonu/documents/Vol07x03TheCauseofCrime.pdf)

That lack of education such as tafe or career skills can lead to increasing crime rates as important social skills can be developed in schooling.

The Sliders of this complex system represent the extent of spending by Law Enforcement, community investment

Parameters:

Community Investment
Law Enforcement

Adjusting spending of these parameters will present different results and different relationships.

About this Model:

The Units of measure has been set to months
Simulation Length is set to 48 months
It must be mentioned that it takes approximately 6 months before youth are sufficiently engaged
The flow committed is a negative relationship, therefore the lower the level of law enforcement chosen, the greater the level of crime will be committed
Similarly, incarcerated into prison will be based on the level of enforcement, if greater law enforcement is applied, there will be more individuals incarcerated and put into prison, vice versa, the less law enforcement applied, more crime will go unnoticed.
Attending Tafe/education relies of the level of community investment spent by the government, If the state government decided to invest more into the community, more youth population will be attending Tafe, though in contrast if less is spent towards Tafe/Eduction, less engagement will occur with the youth population
Tafe/Education is directly linked with the level of crime committed, if more youth population attends tafe/education due to increase in community investment, less crime will be committed. Though, Consequently, the less youth population who attends Tafe/education, the more they will potentially engage in committing a crime.
During periods of high attendance, it was evident that crime rate would drop, though when tafe/education levels have drops to 0 (0 level assumes that youth population either finished the course or left early), crime begins to increase again.

Interesting Simulations

Increasing Community and Law Enforcement to high levels, crime rate decreases and prison rate would naturally increase. Though there seems to be large drops in youths in the town, this can be associated with the large level of community investment as the youth would potentially be in Tafe/Educations during those periods
When simulating with Law Enforcement set to about half way (25) and community investment at 50-70, Tafe/Education begins to severely increase on simulations but has period of decline, which can be linked to completion of course or leaving. During the spike of Tafe/education, crime is quite low, though when it begins to decline, crime starts to once again increase (Tafe/Education vs Crime)
Another interesting simulation is interaction of youth within community sports. Their is allocation for sports spending for youth to help them engage in positive activity in order to avoid crime. By adjusting sports investment it was evident that crime committed was impacted. The most investment into sports, the lower level of crime is committed, if we reduce sports investment, we can see that crime committed begins to increase
Looking at the Released simulation, we acknowledged that is takes approximately 6 months for youth to properly be engaged, so this makes perfect sense that after 6 months, less prisoners are being released as less crime is being committed due to community sports and Tafe/Education

Final Conclusions:

It seems Crime is impacted by many factors such as Tafe/education and community sports. Though the level of crime fluctuates using the parameters, Law Enforcement, Community investment.

By increasing any of these parameters, you will begin to see crime reduce as youth are occupied with other activities in their lives.

Law enforcement does assist with crime but it more so allows less crime to go unnoticed (return) as prison intake increases because more youth are being caught and incarcerated.

assignment3 bourke_43658083

Tiam Rahmati

Model Explanation:

This system dynamics model visualises the impact on investment into policing and community engagement resources on the crime rates within the youth population of Bourke, NSW.
The model also adds in the variable of funding for safe houses. With a high rate of domestic violence, unfavorable home conditions and other socio-economic factors, many youth roam the streets with no safe place to go, which may lead to negative behaviour patterns.

Assumptions

Youth Population: 700
Total youth population in 2016 for Bourke LGA was 646 (ages 10-29). (Census, 2016) Figures rounded to 700 for purposes of this model simulation.

Constants:
70% registration and engagement rates for Community funded programs
30% attendance rate for Safe Houses
50% crime conviction rate

Variables

Positive and Negative Influences

The model shows a number of key variables that lead youth to become more vunerable to commit a crime (such as alienation, coming from households with domestic violence, boredom and socio-economic disadvantages such as low income), as well as the variables that enhance the youth's likelihood to be a contributing member of the community (developing trusted relationships and connections with others, and having a sense of self worth, purpose and pride in the community). These factors (positive and negative) are aggregated to a single rate of 50% each for the purposes of the simulation, however each individual situation would be unique.

Police Funding / Resources

Police funding and resources means the number of active police officers attending to criminal activities, as well as prevention tactics and education programs to reduce negative behaviour. The slider can be moved to increase or decrease policing levels to view the impact on conviction rates. Current policing levels are approx 40 police to a population of under 3000 in Bourke.

Crime Rate

Youth crime rates in Australia were 3.33% (2016). Acknowledging Bourke crime rates are much higher than average, a crime rate of 40% is set initially for this model, but can be varied using the sliders.

Community Program Funding / Resources

Community Program Funding and Resources means money, facilities and people to develop and support the running of programs such as enhancing employability through mentorship and training, recreational sports and clubs, and volunteering opportunities to give back to the community. As engagement levels in the community programs increase, the levels of crime decrease. The slider can be moved to increase or decrease funding levels to view the impact on youth registrations into the community programs.

Observations

Ideally the simulations should show that an increase in police funding reduces crime rates over time, allowing for more youth committing crimes to be convicted and subsequently rehabilitated, therefore decreasing the overall levels of youth at risk.

A portion of those youth still at risk will move to the youth not at risk category through increased funding of safe houses (allowing a space for them to get out of the negative behaviour loop and away), whom them may consider registering into the community engagement programs. An increase in funding in community engagement programs will see more youth become more constructive members of the community, and that may in turn encourage youth at risk to seek out these programs as well by way of social and sub-cultural influences.

Clone of Justice & Community Support Investment and the Impacts on Bourke Youth Population

Hamza Razi

Crime Models