Can an urban area with problems take control of its destiny, say "no" to what's happening and reclaim an identity to be proud of? The National Crime Forum which convenes in Cork today will hear in detail how this happened in the suburb of Mayfield where "joy riding", drug abuse and house robberies once plagued the lives of many residents.
Kathryn Collins works for Cork Corporation as a liaison officer for an estate management project in the Knocknaheeny area of the city. But between 1994 and 1997 she was the secretary of the Ard Bhaile Executive Committee in Mayfield. She and others in the community succeeded in turning a bad situation around - and the lawlessness that was once a problem in parts of Mayfield has virtually stopped.
Kathryn Collins remembers a time in the late 1980s when people were afraid to leave their homes - to do so meant the risk of finding nothing left when they got home. Ard Bhaile, as it is now known, was Mount Erne Flats back then.
The turnover of residents was dramatic, making the area even more prone to crime and vandalism. The situation began to get better in 1991, when local community activists started lobbying for an improvement. The local authority agreed to a major refurbishment project, adult education courses were organised by UCC and a new pride began to develop.
In 1994 the first of the new residents were chosen for the Ard Bhaile Estate - but before they got the keys they had to attend a 10-week pre-tenancy course. Today the area has been returned to normality: people power at work.
The agreement with Cork Corporation is that the residents' committee is responsible for litter control, grass cutting, replacing light bulbs in hallways, staircases and so on and regular inspection of green areas. There is a FAS scheme employing 15 people and a scheme which empowers the residents to carry out inspections with Cork Corporation every week to assess communal areas for vandalism. If there is a breakdown in the arrangement, a mechanism agreed by both sides is there to deal with it.
Ms Collins will tell the forum that this approach could be adopted anywhere in the State.
Another interesting submission will deal with punishment, the deterrent value of prisons, responsibility and restitution. Mr Jim Costello, a director of Forest Produce Ltd in Tralee, Co Kerry, which exports foliage and Christmas trees, has met young people through his work who are trying to come back into society after falling foul of the law.
He will address the forum on young offenders. Crime and criminals, he believes, are perceived as a matter for the Government through the Garda, prisons and social services. But what about bringing young offenders back into society?
If all that faces them after a period of incarceration is to be shunned by society, then they will gravitate back to where they are not shunned, to people who have had the same life experience and for whom a prison sentence is a status symbol.
Work is the key thing. Where former offenders have been accepted into the workplace there have been beneficial effects, Mr Costello will argue.
The forum will also be addressed by Mr Ciaran McCullagh, a lecturer in the department of sociology at UCC and author of Crime in Ireland, who will give details of a survey of six areas of Cork, involving 300 households in which crime was seen as the major problem.
Male batterers and white collar crime are also on the agenda for today.
The National Crime Forum sits in City Hall from 10.3O a.m. until 4 p.m. today