Summary
Great Kills which is a town in Staten Island New York, is a community that is both very quiet and is known for its diversity of small food chain restaurants/options such as Nonna’s and Villa Monte’s which are family owned which consist of Italian food but there are other restaurants such as La Iguana Azul (the blue iguana) which serves Mexican cuisines and Arirang which is known as a Japanese Steakhouse. There are other services for small businesses including laundromats, Local libraries, nail salons, car shops, delis, etc. There are not many big businesses such as Chase or McDonald's. The only big company name is the local CVS. It’s not until you travel into the next town over that you hear the big named companies everyone is familiar with, making the town unique. These local stores influence the socioeconomics and racial ethics within this community. The general population in the U.S Bureau of Conseus in 2020 states that mostly consists of non-Hispanics/ white at 80.3%, second being Latino/ Hispanic following at 9.5%, then Asian at 7.7%, nonhispanic of 2 or more races at 1.6%, then black non-Hispanic at 0.5%, and lastly some other race Nonhispanic at .3%.The U.S. Bureau of Conseus Great Kills has a low poverty rate of 4.1 compared to the citywide poverty rate being 16%, so about ¼ were in poverty, while ¾ of the population was not. But if we were to compare it to Staten Island statistics along it would be considered half of the population to be in poverty. The household income for most families was 100,001-250,000. I believe it is also important to mention that Great Kills consists of both apartment buildings and also houses which is why I would consider it a suburban area than an urbanized community making connections to the community a big deal. Having special connections can also have an impact on the crime levels in Great Kills alone having risen 9.5 % higher from a total of 2,208 crimes in 2022 to 2,418 in 2023. The most recurring crime according to the NYPD Compstat 2.0 in Great Kills is Grand Larceny Auto which is a 76.8% rise from 190- 336, and second being Robbery which raised 11.6% from 284- 317, The last crime rate that has risen would be Grand Larceny which went up 7.6% 870-936 being the most popular crime committed in the area. The crime rates that remained the same were murder at 10 and felony assault at 566. Meanwhile, Burglary went down 10.6% from 263-235 and rape went down 28% from 25-18 ( these statistics following a week-to-date analysis). Patrolling is the most approachable method in this specific area. This could be interrelated with the age and the population within this community as well although most of the population in this area is U.S born, there is a group who we can label as the “disadvantaged”l including the disabled, foreigners, the elder group of 65 and older. The disability population is 6.5% hasn’t changed from 2010-2019. The foreigner group has increased from 2010 to 14.5-16.5% in 2019. Lastly, the elder group has risen as well from 12.5% in 2010 to 17.4 in 2019. Since there has been an increase in people who are considered to be “disadvantaged” making up 40.4% of the population, which could also explain why crimes such as robbery and grand larceny rates have risen and why in certain areas such as by the train station you’ll see high rates of crime occurring and police cars patrolling that area, especially at night. A lot of these crimes taking place are also influenced because of the drug people abuse at the train stations to avoid being caught. You’ll also realize at around night when it starts to get darker out being by the trains at certain times there will be people who will approach you and ask you lots of personal questions and you will be caught in uncomfortable situations so its best you avoid taking the train at night or even being within the vicinity. It is not just at night, it also occurs other times of the day just nights are the most dangerous, a lot of muggings and people being jumped occur here as well, so you really need to be aware of your surroundings.
