Memphis strategic team against rape and sexual assault: One city's struggle to find a new way of doing business, The

University of Memphis Law Review, The, Winter 2002 by Jones, Christopher Leon Jr

Monitoring is a third issue in the implementation stage. As seen in the final stage of the Strategic Approaches model, it is necessary to consider methods to monitor whether the agencies are in fact operating in the manner they said they would operate. The goal is not so much to oversee the agencies, but to make sure they are having the desired effect on the problem and are reaching the team's objectives.

E. Stage Five: Assess and Modify the Strategy As the Data Reveal Effects

There are a number of ways to assess the effectiveness of the strategy, and the research team resumes a prominent role in this stage of the process. It is vital to be flexible and modify where appropriate. We used written reports and updates during our Core Group meetings to monitor our progress; to modify our strategy, we turned back to the researchers who had included a "feedback loop" into their initial data analysis process.

This feedback loop provided for a reexamination of data as reports were made on the interventions. An example of this process at work was the reevaluation of the vehicle offenses typology. Through closer examination of the cases, the team realized that the sexual assault situations in which a vehicle was used in the commission of an offense was not a separate typology; vehicles were actually an instrument that were being used to commit the offenses seen in the adult offender/teen victim typology. As a result of further analysis of the data, our focus was refined; we stopped separating the vehicle offenses as an independent typology and included them as part of the adult offender/teen victim typology.

During this stage of the process, I made a specific effort to visit our partners in one-on-one meetings to determine how the interventions were working and to let people vent any frustrations outside of the formal meeting setting. I received good information that I could use in adjusting the interventions. As we assessed our interventions, we also started to talk about new options and methods to integrate those strategies from the retreat that had been given lower priority rankings.

V. CONCLUSION

Any community that is struggling to find a way to address a persistent crime problem should seriously consider the use of the Strategic Approaches model in developing a crime reduction strategy. The use of the Strategic Approaches model takes political courage. It requires a dedication of personnel, resources, money, and time to do it right. When developing the strategy, it is important to remember some of the common themes noted in the early development of SACSI:

[1] Among the more significant challenges [will be] balancing the desire for quick action with the need to collect and analyze sufficient information so that the problem and best points of intervention can be defined as precisely as possible and the maximum impact and effectiveness achieved.

[2] All the sites recognize how easy it is to slip back into the old ways of doing business-for example, for research partners to revert to their traditional role as neutral observer or for police to believe their job is done when they arrest a suspect.