Impacts of Local Ownership of Vacant Land on Crime
Jenni Collings 
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Demographic and economic trends like suburbanization, deindustrialization, white flight, and foreclosures have resulted in an increase in vacant properties in cities like Chicago. High vacancy rates pose many challenges for cities and residents, including decreasing tax revenues and real estate values, while simultaneously increasing costs to the city and, potentially, crime rates.
Many cities across the United States have taken steps to address high vacancy rates. Examples include building affordable housing units, encouraging owners to improve distressed properties, and selling city-owned vacant land to neighbors. Mathew Stern and T. William Lester recently conducted an assessment of one such program in Chicago called the Large Lots Program. They found that the Large Lots Program is effective in reducing crime rates, with larger effect sizes for locally owned lots.
As a response to population decline and greater vacancy, Chicago created the Adjacent Neighbors Land Acquisition Program in the 1980s to allow owner-occupants of adjacent city-owned property to buy a single vacant lot below market value. After realizing that the restriction to adjacent residents reduced potential participation in ANLAP, the City created an updated program called the Large Lots Program in 2014. This program allowed owners instead of owner-occupants to purchase the land. As a result, the lots had more potential buyers, including block clubs and churches. Buyers could also purchase up to two lots per program cycle for $1 each.
Stern and Lester used 2013 data on lot availability and sales from the Chicago Department of Planning and Development, land use data from the Chicago Metropolitan Agency for Planning, tax assessment data from Cook County, and transaction data from Zillow Inc.’s ZTRAX national data set to identify buyers’ mailing addresses. They used these mailing addresses to determine whether the buyers lived in their lot’s neighborhood. While the loosened restrictions allowed for more residents to participate, the authors found that same-block purchasers only made up 63.6% of the studied sales in the Large Lots Program. Another 5.4% were purchasers who lived in the neighborhood, while 31% had addresses outside the neighborhood altogether. These findings suggest that a substantial proportion of people using the program live outside the neighborhood and could potentially be less invested in the neighborhood’s outcomes.
Stern and Lester also investigated the impact of the Large Lots Program on crime rates and the relationship between length of ownership and physical changes to the lots. They did this by comparing rates before and after the sale of vacant lots. Since changes to a neighborhood don’t happen immediately after a lot is purchased, they focused on crime rates in the first quarter after purchase and one year later. They found statistically significant evidence that a block where at least one Large Lot sale occurred had an average 3.5% lower crime rate one year after purchase compared with similar blocks that did not have any sales. Moreover, blocks with local buyers had a higher crime reduction of 6.8%. While this was not included in their study, these statistics could mean that a local purchase may also affect how quickly a decrease in crime may happen. Someone who lives on the same block may make alterations to the property sooner than someone who doesn’t live nearby, which could result in an earlier reduction in crime.
While private ownership of vacant land may lead to a reduction in crime rates, more needs to be studied about the effects of these kinds of programs. This study does not observe what changes were made to the lots or any other potential benefits that could come from local private ownership. It does not answer questions about increased generational wealth, property values, and the potential for gentrification. Even though the Large Lots Program affects mostly minority neighborhoods, race and disparate impact of the program isn’t considered in this study. Stern and Lester’s methodology warrants further scrutiny; they may have underestimated buyers’ proximity to their purchased lots by mistaking primary home addresses for the addresses of lawyers, family members, or second homes.
Vacant land provides both challenges and opportunities for cities and residents. While vacancy can lower property values, cause cyclical disinvestment, and increase crime rates, it can also provide benefits for communities. It can create new green spaces, provide an opportunity for increased family wealth, and allow local residents to have more control over their communities. While further assessment is warranted, the results of Stern and Lester’s study are promising. They show that cities can reinvest in and reimagine neighborhoods with large numbers of vacant lots through programs like Large Lots in Chicago.
Stern, Matthew, and T. William Lester. 2020. “Does Local Ownership of Vacant Land Reduce Crime?: An Assessment of Chicago’s Large Lots Program.” Journal of the American Planning Association. https://doi.org/10.1080/01944363.2020.1792334.
