OJJDP's State and Community Development (Invited) Awards program was established to provide grants and cooperative agreements to organizations that OJJDP has selected for funds in prior years. Through the Community-Based Violence Prevention Program (CBVP), OJJDP funds organizations working to reduce youth gun and gang violence through evidence-based models. These programs have been authorized by an Act appropriating funds for the Department of Justice.
The City of Newark proposes to use supplemental funding to enhance its existing Hotspot Initiative. The goals of this enhancement will be to engage the diversity of faith leadership and institutions within the city to work in concert with CBVP project staff and stakeholders to prevent and reduce youth gun and gang violence and victimization in the selected neighborhoods and establish community safe havens where churches and other faith based institutions will serve as neutral ground where gang conflicts can be addressed. The City of Newark will use the safe havens to house offender/victim restorative justice meetings and call-ins, in which police, probation officers, and community leaders offer gang leaders and other criminals the chance to go straight and get help with obtaining education and jobs. It will also develop a mentoring program to connect faith leaders and institutions with high-risk young people; conduct crisis intervention that will add faith leadership to the existing outreach team that responds to shootings in selected neighborhoods; and convene a community policy and planning working group quarterly to help Newark stakeholders and the public better understand the link between violence in the schools, home, and broader community and identify solutions.
To meet these goals, the City of Newark will draw on the National Forum for Violence Prevention model in assembling a working group of various Newark stakeholders working to reduce violence. The impact of this grant will be on the entire City of Newark, as increased coordination among faith leadership and their congregations, local agencies and the development of a multi-sector collaborative process will create a more efficient and effective system for combating violence throughout the City. Funds will also be used to enable participation in national CBVP technical assistance opportunities including the fall 2015 convening.
CA/NCF
