Defending Childhood Initiative

Portland Defending Childhood (PDC) is a collaboration of agencies in Portland, Maine whose goal is to reduce exposure to violence; and address the negative effects for children who have experienced violence. Using OJJDP continuation funding, Portland Defending Childhood employs a three-pronged approach focusing on prevention, intervention, and treatment. The three program goals are:
1) Children will be prevented from exposure to violence through education and early intervention; 2) Children exposed to violence will be identified, supported and referred to services; and 3) Children who have been exposed to violence will have access to affordable, culturally competent, age-appropriate and evidence-based trauma treatment, as needed.
NCA/NCF

OJJDP's State and Community Development Awards program was established to provide grants and cooperative agreements to organizations that OJJDP has selected for funds in prior years. This program has been authorized by an Act appropriating funds for the Department of Justice.

The Attorney General's Children Exposed to Violence Demonstration Program will develop and support comprehensive community-based strategic planning and implementation efforts to prevent and reduce the impact of children's exposure to violence in their homes, schools, and communities.

Portland Defending Childhood (PDC) is a collaboration of agencies in Portland, Maine whose goal is to reduce exposure to violence and address its consequences for children who have experienced violence. Using OJJDP continuation funding, Portland Defending Childhood employs a public health approach focusing on prevention, intervention, and treatment.

The goals are: 1) Children will be prevented from exposure to violence through education and early intervention; 2) Children exposed to violence will be identified, supported and referred to services; and 3) Children who have been exposed to violence will have access to affordable, culturally competent, age-appropriate and evidence-based trauma treatment, as needed.

More specifically, Defending Childhood activities undertaken through this grant are:

Prevention: (1) Develop additional culturally and linguistically competent public awareness resources; (2) Increase representation on the Advisory Committee of racial and ethnic minority communities; (3) Expand media campaign to include a wider range of media; (4) Implement Coaching Boys Into Men program in at least one Portland public high school; (5) Implement violence prevention curricula and provide training in early learning/pre-school classrooms; (6) Conduct pilot of PDC curriculum recommendations and implement in the Portland Public Schools.

Intervention: (1) Family Crisis Services Children's Advocate/Case Manager will provide case management services to children at the local domestic violence shelter; (2) Pine Tree Legal Assistance will provide direct legal advocacy and representation to children exposed to violence in need of legal services; (3) The International Association of Chiefs of Police will train local law enforcement in partnership with the Yale Child Study
Center: (4) Family Crisis Services digital outreach efforts to youth about dating violence will be expanded.

Treatment: (1) Clinicians will be trained to deliver and provide supervision for Child and Family Traumatic Stress Intervention; (2) Reflective consultation and advanced training for clinicians already implementing Child Parent Psychotherapy.

Data and Evaluation: (1) Conduct internal evaluation on process and outcome measures
of proposed activities; (2) Conduct quality improvement projects as needed to address
gaps in service delivery and quality. No portion of the project budget will be used to conduct "research" as described in the Application Guidance.

NCA/NCF

OJJDP's State and Community Development Awards program was established to provide grants and cooperative agreements to organizations that OJJDP has selected for funds in prior years. This program has been authorized by an Act appropriating funds for the Department of Justice. The Attorney General's Children Exposed to Violence Demonstration Program develops and supports comprehensive community-based strategic planning and implementation efforts to prevent and reduce the impact of children's exposure to violence in their homes, schools, and communities.

Portland Defending Childhood (PDC) is a collaboration of agencies in Portland, Maine with the goal of reducing children's exposure to violence and addressing the negative effects for children who have experienced violence. The two lead agencies of PDC are: Portland Public Health (PPH) (lead applicant) and Maine Behavioral Healthcare (MBH) (formerly known as Community Counseling Center). Supporting the project are an Executive Committee and an Advisory Committee comprised of representatives from over 20 agencies. Using a public health model, PDC employs a three-pronged approach focusing on prevention, intervention, and treatment. This approach to preventing and treating children exposed to violence has shown great promise. PDC will utilize FY14 State and Community Development Invited Award funds for activities to include supporting the collection of demographic data about children exposed to violence in Portland and internal evaluations on process and outcome measures of the proposed activities. NCA/NCF