What is community violence intervention?

Let’s be honest: We have never had a successful public safety strategy in Black and brown communities.

Until now.

Imagine an effective policing strategy that makes neighborhoods safe; causes residents to feel protected, without others being dehumanized in the process; and generates mutual trust between law enforcement and the populace.

So far this year, at least 312 people have been slain in Chicago as of last week. During the Juneteenth holiday weekend, 75 Chicagoans were shot. At least 13 died. According to data provided by the faith-based coalition Live Free Chicago, the rate at which police solve Black homicides is 21%.

A recent Department of Justice review of the Minneapolis Police Department revealed routine discrimination and use of deadly force without justification against Black and brown people. U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland said, “The patterns and practices we observed made what happened to George Floyd possible.”

While traditional policing approaches are ineffective, a burgeoning national model of community-driven public safety is not getting the recognition, reverence and resources its innovation and long-term impact warrant as a viable and sustainable alternative.

It’s called CVI, which stands for community violence intervention.

According to the DOJ, CVI is “an approach that uses evidence-informed strategies to reduce violence through tailored community-centered initiatives. These multidisciplinary strategies engage individuals and groups to prevent and disrupt cycles of violence and retaliation, and establish relationships between individuals and community assets to deliver services that save lives, address trauma, provide opportunity, and improve the physical, social, and economic conditions that drive violence.”

In Chicago, the CVI ecosystem is supported by local and state public agencies, as well as the philanthropic and business community. It relies on street outreach workers recruited, trained and hired by hyperlocal community-based organizations to intervene, mediate and prevent gun-related conflicts, monitor emergent activities and mentor those at the highest risk of violence involvement.

Participants have access to case managers who offer a menu of direct services including victim services, legal advocacy, employment support, educational opportunities, hospital response, housing assistance and trauma-informed behavioral health counseling.

Communities Partnering 4 Peace, or CP4P, functions as a collaborative network of 14 community-based organizations administering community violence intervention programming in the 27 Chicago communities with the most gun violence. Each member organization has first-responder, front-line gun violence intervention expertise, anchored by teams of street outreach workers with a license to operate — that is, the historical knowledge, relationships and credibility within their community to mitigate gun violence. Most were at one point involved in the justice system and live in the communities where they operate.

And it’s working.

According to research on CP4P conducted by Northwestern University’s Center for Neighborhood Engaged Research and Science, or CORNERS, 30% of the Chicago communities examined and affected by CVI experienced significantly favorable changes in nonfatal shootings and homicide rates.

Its effectiveness in recalibrating public safety in communities most affected by gun violence has been proved nationwide. CVI has a history of mitigating gun violence in Baltimore; Boston; Los Angeles; Miami; New York; Newark, New Jersey; and Philadelphia.

No, CVI will not whisk away gun violence over the course of one year or a mayoral term. There is no panacea for a systemic problem. Community gun violence is a symptom reflecting decades of intentional disregard of poor and segregated communities of color within public policy.

But police undertaking the entire public safety burden has proved to be costly, harmful and futile. Law enforcement approaches are successful only when residents are actively engaged. While police are responsible for crime suppression, local CVI networks earn the trust of those at highest risk through restoration and empowerment.

Improving safety and building mutual trust require adopting a shared model that includes, but is not limited to, police work and hyperlocal CVI partners in high-risk communities to do the heavy lifting.

Over time, with long-term consistency, with police doing their part to protect and serve and CVI delivering services that restore and empower, community-driven solutions, in partnership with business, government and philanthropy, aimed at bringing down Chicago’s gun violence will be realized.

Vaughn Bryant is executive director of Metropolitan Peace Initiatives (MPI), a division of Metropolitan Family Services that works in partnership with community-based groups to coordinate, support and sustain comprehensive services for communities that have experienced the highest levels of gun violence

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