Alleviating poverty cuts crime

As law enforcement officials, our responsibility is public safety — first, last and always. There’s no substitute for tough law enforcement and locking up dangerous offenders. However, we also strongly believe that it is important to take advantage of opportunities to prevent crime in the first place.

Helping children move out of poverty, or avoid poverty altogether, can cut crime. The sad reality is that a child who grows up in poverty, especially sustained poverty, is more likely to be involved in later crime.

Today, one in six Maine children lives in poverty. Here in Androscoggin County, child poverty rates are especially high. Lewiston’s child poverty rate is more than 40 percent, the highest of all Maine communities; followed by Auburn with a child poverty rate of more than 25 percent, the second highest in Maine.

We know from experience that children who grow up in low-income households have a greater risk of becoming adult criminals. A report from the Surgeon General on youth violence found that children from poor families have a much greater chance of becoming involved in violent crime than children from better-off families. One study found that the risk of becoming violent criminals is two-and-a-half times higher for low-income kids than for other children.

Recently, Fight Crime: Invest In Kids issued a report “Cutting Crime by Cutting Child Poverty in Maine,” that shows how reducing child poverty can significantly lower crime. Research published in the Journal of the American Medical Association indicates that when parents’ income is increased to above the poverty level, children in those no-longer-poor families experienced a 40 percent decrease in conduct disorders and opposition defiant disorders. These behavior disorders are precursors to later juvenile and adult crime.

Increasing the incomes of these families can substantially reduce a child’s likelihood of later crime. In fact, this behavior of kids in the study changed so rapidly, that within four years the no-longer-poor families had the same lower rates of behavior disorders linked to crime as middle-class families.

That’s why we are asking Congress to help improve the financial security of working families and also improve public safety by extending the enhancements to the federal child tax credit, which are scheduled to expire at the end of this year.

The current child tax credit, as enhanced by the recovery package, provides help to 60,000 Maine children who could lose these benefits or see them substantially reduced if Congress takes no legislative action. Currently, families qualify for the refundable portion of the child tax credit once they have earned at least $3,000. If Congress does not act, the threshold will increase from $3,000 up to approximately $13,000, excluding many poor, working parents from receiving the refundable tax credit and reducing the benefits for many others.

Recipients of refundable child tax credits are the families most likely to spend the money by taking care of necessities rather than banking it. Strengthening the child tax credit is, therefore, also one of the surest ways of pumping money into the economy. Simply put, allowing lower-income working families to keep more of their earned income would help more families make ends meet, lift more children out of poverty, strengthen the economy and decrease the likelihood that children will commit crimes as teens and adults.

As a member of the U.S. Senate Finance Committee, we know that Sen. Olympia Snowe is working hard to help us fight our way out of our recession, and that she wants to help make sure that Maine kids get the right start. Sen. Snowe has been a strong supporter of the child tax credit in the past and is currently working hard in the Finance Committee on this issue. We appreciate all of her work on behalf of so many Mainers in need. We also appreciate that Sen. Susan Collins, and Reps. Mike Michaud and Chellie Pingree supported lowering the threshold for the child tax credit back in 2009 and hope they will also support extending this provision when it comes before the full Senate and House.

We believe that crime can be prevented if we get out in front on the issues, like extending the child tax credit, which research shows makes a real difference in the lives of at-risk kids. Tax benefits such as the child tax credit can help change the odds by putting more poor kids on the right path and giving them a better shot of being successful — and that’s the ticket to ultimately reducing crime.

Guy Desjardins is the Androscoggin County Sheriff and James Minkowsky is the Deputy Police Chief in Lewiston. Both are members of Fight Crime: Invest In Kids.