More Money Should Be Invest into Public Recreation

Recently, youth violence occurring in Toronto has increased significantly. Youth violence is defined as an action committed intentionally by teenagers that are harmful to self and/or others. Some examples of youth violence include bullying, sexual assault, harassment, illegal weapons usage and drug abuse that can lead to violence. A recent research released by Statistics Canada states that “about 13% of students reported participating in violent delinquent behaviour. Those in grades 8 and 9 were slightly more likely to have reported being involved in a violent delinquent behaviour than grade 7 students” (Self-reported Delinquency among Young People in Toronto, 2006). Youth violence is an issue that the City of Toronto should be aware of and must spend more time and money on. For the past two to three years, most of the deaths due to violence are mostly related to teenagers, many of these violent acts are done in schools, of which many of are gang related issues. “About 1 in 6 homicides, 104, were linked to organized crime or street gangs, of which 61 were reported by police as “confirmed” as being gang-related and 43 more were reported as “suspected” of being gang-related” (Li, 2006). Youth violence is an important issue debated within the City Hall of Toronto; many of the councillors are debating rather to invest the public funds in the public recreation or police services. Many would say to invest more money in the police services to hire more officers, and some say invest the money into public recreation programs. Public recreation programs seem pricier, compared to the police services, but police services can only act as an enforcement of law, and cannot stop crimes. The City of Toronto would address youth violence more effectively if the City of Toronto invests public funds in the public recreation instead of police services; since recreation services are more appropriate to prevent violence, and have huge educating purposes. On the other hand police services can only act as crime stopping, and enforcing the law, and when police officers are not present on scene violence would mostly likely occur.

Argument in favour of my position

In many neighbourhoods that do not have places for children to play or where it is not safe to let children use the parks and facilities that do exist, investing public funds into public recreational services would be more beneficial to the youths in Toronto. Many researches had been done on the relationship between extracurricular activities and violence among the teenagers groups. Eccles and Barber (1999) found that adolescents who were involved in pro-social activities had high academic achievement and low rates of involvement in risky behaviours, such as drug abuse, and violent act. Investing more public funds would mean community centres would be one of the areas that the money would be invested on. Community centres may be serving as one of the protective factors; community centres provide youths a place to go during after school hours and to avoid potentially dangerous places (Linville and Huebner, 2005). Researcher also found that youths who spend time within a recreational program would spend less time around negative influencing peers. Recreational programs can help youths in many ways, such as building self confidence, meet new friends, carry out a healthier life style, and help at-risk youths.

Most educators agree that learning about violence and its prevention should begin as early as possible. Money should be invested into after school activities, allowing schools to provide educational information on youth violence. The school, acting as one of the most important way to pass on knowledge, play a very essential role for the youths. School-based and government-based programs would be more efficient to lower violence among kids compared to non-school and non-government programs. Non-school and non-government programs tend to have inadequate supervision; some of them might be a lack of organization (Linville, D. C., and Huebner, A. J., 2005). A few studies suggest that involvement in extracurricular activities may decrease the likelihood of involvement in violence (Eccles and Barber, 1999; Stevens and Peltier, 1994). Youths spend the majority of time at school, and most of their knowledge is obtained in school, and teachers also play a significant role in their life. Public funds can be invested into school recreational programs to help youths, and prevent violence. Many youths do not have someone to talk to and that results in miscommunication with parents, and will likely carry out negative behaviours such as violence.

Arguments in opposition to my position

Some may argue that the public funds should be invested into police services, but in reality police