(05/23/17) TALLULAH, La. – Community leaders wanting to reclaim a local park and playground known as “the slab” learned strategies to design out crime as part of an LSU AgCenter Healthy Communities-sponsored Crime Prevention through Environmental Design workshop held May 19 in Tallulah.

“There is already a really good energy around the park,” said Jamie Rae Walker, Texas AgriLife extension specialist and workshop facilitator.

Walker visited the park and said it was evident that locals are excited about the revitalization project. “That’s the beginning of any project; people who care and want to keep their eyes on it and be around it,” she said.

The park revitalization is an ongoing project selected by the community leaders as part of the AgCenter Healthy Communities initiative.

Healthy Communities is funded through a grant from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and partners the AgCenter with the Southern University Ag Center, Pennington Biomedical Research Center and the Louisiana Department of Health.

Victoria McDonald, AgCenter Healthy Communities project coordinator, said the goal of the slab project is to design the park in a way to prevent crime in the area so people feel safer using the park.

“Everyone knows about the slab. The older folks know the history and origin, and the newer members see the potential in how it can be used now,” she said.

The purpose of the workshop is to help community leaders identify and evaluate environmental conditions at the park and develop design strategies to reduce opportunities for undesirable behavior and criminal activity, McDonald said.

“Seeing how the park plan is coming, what we need to do now is sit down and come up with a true maintenance plan that will help expedite the development,” said Carlos Ford, City of Tallulah Park and Recreations director.

Dealing with trash and debris is a big part of the problem, and the park project may ignite some pride and community ownership, Ford said.

“Anytime you have citizens groups and community leadership on board, and a little bit of seed grant money to push it through, that’s where you really see big change,” Walker said.

The workshop is a systematic way for participants to evaluate what is working and what is not, and then identify some tools useful in designing a plan to move forward, she said.

“When you look at issues like crime and loss prevention in a park that needs some love – and this park needs some love – it can be overwhelming to figure out where to start,” Walker said.

The process takes away that confusion and goes beyond just the park. The design tools can be used in any type of environment or setting to reinvigorate the community, she said.

The workshop is a best practice approach using a curriculum developed by the National Institute for Crime Prevention to fight crime and promote business in neighborhoods, schools and parks to create safer places for activity.

The program focuses on four overlapping principles that maximize visibility through natural surveillance, control access by strategic design, define spaces to reinforce positive territorial ownership and provide maintenance for continued use.

The process encourages people to look at the problems from a different perspective and helps bring together important community assets, said Mike Lopez, Texas AgriLife extension health program specialist.

“You can tell the catalyst has begun, and this can hopefully push things along,” Lopez said.

AgCenter Healthy Communities program manager Elisabeth Altazan said the workshop is a good fit with revitalization work that has already begun.

The coalition is getting input from the community and really taking the time to think about what will work and be sustainable, she said.

“This is not the AgCenter’s project,” Altazan said. “This is Tallulah’s project.”

The next step will bring in the Center for Planning Excellence to further address walkability issues identified in this and other recent workshops, she said.

The CPEX Complete Streets project will kick off in early June with project completion set for September, Altazan said.

Carlos Ford, City of Tallulah Parks and Recreation director, right, works with Madison Parish Healthy Communities coalition members Roslyn Randle and George Shepherd to develop strategies for crime and loss prevention at a local park/playground known as “the slab.” Photo by Karol Osborne/LSU AgCenter