National Initiative to Reduce Gun Homicides by 20 Percent Over 5 Years Launches in First 4 Cities
BUILDING ON PROVEN COMMUNITY SOLUTIONS TO GUN VIOLENCE, NATIONAL EFFORT BRINGS EXPERTISE AND MILLIONS IN FUNDING
February 22, 2023—During Black History Month—when the accomplishments, strife, and resilience of the Black struggle are brought to the forefront of the American public as means to remind our nation that truly without Black History, there is no American history—four national Black-led organizations committed to ending gun violence are partnering with mayors across the nation to scale up, unite and bring cohesion to the growing movement of the community violence intervention (CVI) ecosystem.
Building off the core values of community and resilience last week, the Coalition to Advance Public Safety (CAPS) kicked off its groundbreaking initiative to reduce gun homicides and non-fatal shootings by 20 percent over the next five years in Newark, Baltimore, Baton Rouge, and Indianapolis—the first four of an expected 12 cities where CAPS will work with mayors, community-based organizations, and communities to scale up, unite and bring greater cohesion and funding to cities’ community violence intervention (CVI) ecosystems.
“Today we take a historic step in our journey to reimagine public safety. The Coalition to Advance Public Safety will change the way cities and their partners across the country invest in themselves by saving lives and strengthening communities. I’m honored that Cities United is leading such an important effort, alongside national partners, philanthropic supporters, and local governments' leadership,” said Anthony Smith, Executive Director of Cities United.
In addition to bringing the training and technical assistance to each of the cities, CAPS will help coordinate up to $500,000 available as mini-grants within each jurisdiction.
Last year, gun violence decreased slightly but still claimed over twenty thousand lives for the second year in a row. While the recent spikes in violence and relentless incidents of mass shootings have sparked new public attention to the urgent crisis of gun violence in this country, this epidemic has devastated communities of color for decades. Between 2000 and 2018, 162,000 Black Americans—including 139,000 Black men—died violent deaths; among those, 85 percent were killed by gun violence. Much of this violence stems from systemic and pervasive inequities such as poverty, barriers to health care, and insufficient educational and economic opportunities.
Fortunately, growing support for the CVI Movement is providing cities and mayors greater hope that similar to the COVID pandemic, we can end this pandemic of gun violence.
Baltimore Mayor Brandon R. Scott highlighted the progress made using CVI in Baltimore. “West Baltimore, the home of Freddie Gray, the home of the Wire and countless television shows, saw a 30 percent reduction in violence,” he said, adding, “We have to scale up this work and build up (CVI) ecosystems across the country so that we can truly produce the best outcomes.”
Mayor Sharon Weston Broome of Baton Rouge, LA, pointed to last year’s “23 percent reduction in homicides, and a 14 percent reduction in non-fatal shootings,” in her city as powerful evidence of CVI’s potential. “The complexity of violence can’t be simply addressed without the trust, the buy-in, and partnership of the communities that are most affected by violence,” she added.
Newark, NJ, mayor Ras Baraka embraced the idea of CVI as soon as he was elected in 2015 and sees Newark’s 60-year low in homicides last year as clear evidence that with more resources and support, cities can do even more.
“I’m excited about what CAPS offers here,” said Mayor Baraka. “Many Black and Brown organizations are led by Black and Brown people in these communities who fight the fight but do not have the resources and support that they need. This gives us the opportunity to supplement what we are doing on a municipal level, some of the things that are happening on a state level, and resources that are coming together around this to focus and channel those resources into the right organizations and right folks that are closer to this problem and that can get this solved.”
These first four cities represent the pioneering efforts in quantifying the core components and refining the interrelationships necessary to bring the CVI Ecosystem to scale in ways that are self-correcting, quantitative, and strategic—and most importantly, adaptable to any city, jurisdiction, or area of our nation.
To support this work, and help cities better quantify the problem of gun violence, CAPS has developed cviecosystem.org, a powerful online tool providing data and analysis of CVI Ecosystems for 50 U.S. cities with high homicide rates. The site represents a significant step forward in dispelling common myths about gun violence in communities while informing cities about what an ideal CVI Ecosystem looks like.
“First important thing for you all to understand is that violence, community violence in particular, is highly concentrated,” said Fatimah Loren Dreier, Executive Director of The HAVI. “A 2015 analysis found that 50 percent of all homicides in the United States are concentrated in 127 cities. And within those cities it's only a fraction of a percent of individuals who are—again through neglect—caught in cycles of violence. So, there are structural problems, and they can be addressed with structural and targeted interventions.”
Advocates agree.
“CVI has been reducing violence in urban communities for close to three decades. The work is evidence-based, and data-informed, yet historically underfunded and fragmented. CAPS’ focus will be to build CVI organizational infrastructure—both fiscally and programmatically—to serve as a core partner in cities’ public safety strategy,” said Aqeela Sherrills, Executive Director, CBPS Collective. “CVI does not seek to disrupt nor replace any resource but to unite the entire community in efforts to eliminate violence,” he added.
For funders supporting this work, it is the strategic approach of connecting the dots among various intervention strategies and scaling them up into a cohesive ecosystem that moves community and gun violence beyond a simple criminal justice frame and leans into a collective public health frame that resonates and gets their support.
“The impact of pervasive violence reverberates beyond individuals to neighborhoods and communities, interrupting and limiting the opportunities that drive economic mobility. Ballmer Group is proud to support these four organizations—whose approaches have been proven to reduce and prevent violence—to work together and to build on strengths and resources that communities already have,” said Nina Revoyr, Executive Director of Ballmer Group - Los Angeles. “We remain committed to supporting community-led violence intervention and building the public health ecosystem necessary to end violence.”
CAPS is composed of the Health Alliance for Violence Intervention (the HAVI), the National Institute for Criminal Justice Reform (NICJR), the Community Based Public Safety Collective (the Collective), and Cities United. The four groups that comprise CAPS have worked together for years and most recently served as the training and technical assistance providers for the recently ended 18-month White House Community Violence Intervention Collaborative (CVIC). The new initiative will build off lessons learned and strategies utilized in support of CVIC.