I'd be quite the hypocrite to ask people to populate this blog with their stories and not start with my own, so here is my first ever social action project: a petition campaign to improve the quality of street lighting on my road and reduce the community's fear of crime.
Background
It was January 2009, which all things considered was not a great time for me. I was unemployed, spent most of my days at home alone, and - thanks to the complete lack of insulation and faulty boiler of my then apartment - was very very cold. I needed to keep myself busy, so I started volunteering with my local branch of the Liberal Democrats (no, I'm not a paid up member any more - yes, I'd still vote for them) who I had joined when I was a student.
Where I started
My job was to get to know the people in my neighbourhood by knocking on their doors asking them if they had any particular issues they wanted the local council to do something about. I thought: where better to start than my own road, Goldhurst Terrace? So, my mentor at the time, another campaigner, named Ben, encouraged me to think about what I would change about Goldhurst Terrace if I could. My first answer was street lights. I didn't think much of it at the time other than they were so dim, it made walking home at night a little nerve-wracking as it was a very long road with rarely anyone else around.
The Problem
After introducing myself to most of my neighbours, it turned out I wasn't alone in thinking this. In fact, there was a massive fear of crime up and down the road, made worse by a recent spate of burglaries. One resident had got so worked up, they had invited everyone to a meeting at their house to discuss what to do. I duly went along and found out their plan was to ask all of us to collectively fund a mobile street patrol operated by a group of ex-Ghurkas to watch out for baddies and refer them to the police. The only issue was the cost, which was perfectly affordable for the very wealthy home-owners in the bottom half of the road, but a big ask for the renters on the top half (like me) who were only just getting by as it was. Their proposed solution? The street patrol would ignore anything that happened on the top half of the road and just look after the bottom half.
I wasn't convinced a street patrol was the answer and I was horrified at the thought that each resident's entitlement to be safe in their own community was dependent on their ability to pay for it. I asked Ben for advice. He suggested I consult the local police for their opinion. They were against the street patrol too as they thought it diminished the role of the police and encouraged vigilante justice. They also said the stats didn't bear out the claims of a crime wave in Goldhurst Terrace. It just so happened that a bunch of burglaries had happened all at once and the fear of crime had shot up as a result. What about the street lights? It would help if they were brighter, they told me, but that was the council's job.
Finding the right solution
After doing some research, I found a study by the Home Office, which showed that in both the UK and the US, several councils had tested the idea of improving the quality of street lighting to quell the rising fear of crime as a cheaper alternative to beefing up local police forces. As a result, not only did the local residents in those areas agree that the brighter street lights made them feel a lot safer, but actual crime went down too, which the report suggested was because criminals felt a lot more exposed in better lit roads and less likely to get away with whatever they were planning. Now, I just had to convince my neighbours that this was a better idea than the street patrol and find a way to make it happen.
Putting the plan into action
So, I designed a petition calling on the council to upgrade the street lights on Goldhurst Terrace and spent the next two weeks collecting over 200 signatures, mostly on evenings and weekends when I knew I was most likely to catch people, and explaining what I wanted to do. More importantly, the local residents' association publicly supported the campaign too, while the press gave it some much needed exposure after I issued a press release peppered with quotes from local residents and pictures of the petition, which looked like a long scroll, each page stapled to the bottom of the one before it to showcase all the signatures.
After that, I went back to the police and they offered to help further by speaking to local residents about how to improve their existing security systems, while Ben and several councillors, who were also members of the party, made sure the petition was passed on to the right council officer who could actually do something about it. By the middle of February, I received the good news: every single street light (about 150) would be replaced and upgraded within three months. I followed up with a letter to all the residents along with another press release, which got far more coverage this time.
The project had taken just over a month from start to finish. I'd spent about 40 hours on it in total, had spoken to over 400 people and had been invited to join the Safer Neighbourhood Panel, a committee of councillors and residents responsible for representing the community to the police. Most importantly of all, though, the divisive street patrol idea never got off the ground and Goldhurst Terrace became one of the best lit roads in the area and a lot safer for it.
What I learned from my first social action project
The big lessons I learnt from my first social action project were the following:
Background
It was January 2009, which all things considered was not a great time for me. I was unemployed, spent most of my days at home alone, and - thanks to the complete lack of insulation and faulty boiler of my then apartment - was very very cold. I needed to keep myself busy, so I started volunteering with my local branch of the Liberal Democrats (no, I'm not a paid up member any more - yes, I'd still vote for them) who I had joined when I was a student.
Where I started
My job was to get to know the people in my neighbourhood by knocking on their doors asking them if they had any particular issues they wanted the local council to do something about. I thought: where better to start than my own road, Goldhurst Terrace? So, my mentor at the time, another campaigner, named Ben, encouraged me to think about what I would change about Goldhurst Terrace if I could. My first answer was street lights. I didn't think much of it at the time other than they were so dim, it made walking home at night a little nerve-wracking as it was a very long road with rarely anyone else around.
The Problem
After introducing myself to most of my neighbours, it turned out I wasn't alone in thinking this. In fact, there was a massive fear of crime up and down the road, made worse by a recent spate of burglaries. One resident had got so worked up, they had invited everyone to a meeting at their house to discuss what to do. I duly went along and found out their plan was to ask all of us to collectively fund a mobile street patrol operated by a group of ex-Ghurkas to watch out for baddies and refer them to the police. The only issue was the cost, which was perfectly affordable for the very wealthy home-owners in the bottom half of the road, but a big ask for the renters on the top half (like me) who were only just getting by as it was. Their proposed solution? The street patrol would ignore anything that happened on the top half of the road and just look after the bottom half.
I wasn't convinced a street patrol was the answer and I was horrified at the thought that each resident's entitlement to be safe in their own community was dependent on their ability to pay for it. I asked Ben for advice. He suggested I consult the local police for their opinion. They were against the street patrol too as they thought it diminished the role of the police and encouraged vigilante justice. They also said the stats didn't bear out the claims of a crime wave in Goldhurst Terrace. It just so happened that a bunch of burglaries had happened all at once and the fear of crime had shot up as a result. What about the street lights? It would help if they were brighter, they told me, but that was the council's job.
Finding the right solution
After doing some research, I found a study by the Home Office, which showed that in both the UK and the US, several councils had tested the idea of improving the quality of street lighting to quell the rising fear of crime as a cheaper alternative to beefing up local police forces. As a result, not only did the local residents in those areas agree that the brighter street lights made them feel a lot safer, but actual crime went down too, which the report suggested was because criminals felt a lot more exposed in better lit roads and less likely to get away with whatever they were planning. Now, I just had to convince my neighbours that this was a better idea than the street patrol and find a way to make it happen.
Putting the plan into action
So, I designed a petition calling on the council to upgrade the street lights on Goldhurst Terrace and spent the next two weeks collecting over 200 signatures, mostly on evenings and weekends when I knew I was most likely to catch people, and explaining what I wanted to do. More importantly, the local residents' association publicly supported the campaign too, while the press gave it some much needed exposure after I issued a press release peppered with quotes from local residents and pictures of the petition, which looked like a long scroll, each page stapled to the bottom of the one before it to showcase all the signatures.
After that, I went back to the police and they offered to help further by speaking to local residents about how to improve their existing security systems, while Ben and several councillors, who were also members of the party, made sure the petition was passed on to the right council officer who could actually do something about it. By the middle of February, I received the good news: every single street light (about 150) would be replaced and upgraded within three months. I followed up with a letter to all the residents along with another press release, which got far more coverage this time.
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| Local newspaper, the Hampstead and Highgate Express reports the campaign's success |
What I learned from my first social action project
The big lessons I learnt from my first social action project were the following:
- Speak to your local community and find out first hand what they need or would be willing to be support - it is as simple as knocking on your neighbour's door and saying hello.
- Analyse closely what your community is telling you and look for the underlying cause of their anxiety.
- Find out who is responsible for making the decisions that most directly affect your community - they will have access to expertise and information that can help you and could be instrumental to the success of your project.
- Collaborate with people or organisations who share your values - charities, associations, clubs, campaign organisations, and yes political parties. They will form the backbone of your team, give you great ideas, and help you wherever they can simply because they want the same things you do.
- Plan your project and make sure you have a very clear idea of what change you want to make as you will have to talk about it a lot and people will have questions and possibly alternative ideas that you will need to respond to.
- Check you have enough time to do all of this - how long do you think it will take you, what times of day will you need to be available e.t.c?
- Promote your cause in the press: writing a press release is pretty simple - start with a short snappy sentence that will get an editor's attention, explain what you're doing and why in a series of a few short sentences, add a few quotes from people relevant to the story (they don't necessarily have to be famous) and take plenty of pictures.
- Update your supporters and share your news: collect email addresses and phone numbers of every person you speak to - don't assume everyone uses social media as frequently as you might. Every time you get some good news, tell them.
- Finally, REPEAT steps 1-8: one good social action project may very well lead to the next and from there - who knows what a difference you could make?
