The Community’s Perception

In a survey conducted by Mayor Daley’s YouthNet, a youth oriented umbrella organization, residents from Chicago’s 14th District, home to the Logan Square community and the majority of the Humboldt Park community, identified gangs, youth crimes, alcohol and drug abuse, and school dropouts as the most prevalent problems they face in their community. Residents from the 25th district, home to the Hermosa community, also identified gangs as a major problem, as well as teen pregnancy, youth unemployment, immigration barriers, and school overcrowding as major obstacles toward success.

The surveys further indicate that community residents attribute such issues to a “shortage of certain services in the community such as alcohol and substance abuse counseling and gang intervention and programs for youth… allowing the problems mentioned above to boom, and create rifts in the fabric of the community.”

How the Data Stacks Up

Gangs:

• The Chicago Police Department reports that there are at least 40 organized gangs operating in Chicago, with at least 38,000 members. Most often, their crimes are related to turf, narcotics activity, or both, and their main source of income for most gangs is narcotics.
• Sadly, gangs have been targeting younger and younger members because of the less stringent penalties juvenile offenders are subject to.
• Furthermore, Logan Square and Humboldt Park alone are home to 14 of the city’s 132 gangs

Youth Crimes:

• In the 25th district (Hermosa), there was a 20% juvenile arrest rate in 2003. (25th District YouthNet Community Needs Assessment, 2003).
• Juveniles who were arrested in 2000 accounted for an estimated 7% of the juvenile population aged 10 to 16 years residing in Chicago. (Chicago Police Department)

Alcohol and Drug Abuse:

• According to the Illinois Youth Survey, in the year 2002, 41.7% of 8th grade CPS students, 64.7% of 10th grade CPS students, and 63.7% of 12th grade CPS students reported using alcohol in the past year.
• 15.8% of 8th grade CPS students, 36.3% of 10th grade CPS students, and 33.4% of 12th grade CPS students.
• The top offense that juveniles were arrested for in 2003 was drug abuse violations (50.8% involved cannabis) at 5,059 arrests. (Chicago Police Department, Research and Development Division)

School Dropouts:

• The University of Chicago’s Consortium on Chicago School Research reported that only 54% of the students who entered CPS schools as freshman in 2000 graduated four years later in 2004. (The University of Chicago Chronicle; February 3, 2005, Vol.24 no.9)
• The average high school dropout rate in Hermosa was 22.2%. (Chicago Public Schools)

Teen Pregnancy:

• According to the Annie E. Casey Foundation, in the year 2000, 9% of all Hispanic girls between the ages of 15 to 19 in the state of Illinois, gave birth. Although the data was unavailable, the pregnancy rate was even higher, when accounting for miscarriages and abortions.

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