FY15 Youth Violence Prevention (YVP) Expansion and Enhancement Project

The primary goals of the OJJDP youth violence portfolio are to promote the wellbeing of children, youth, and families; reduce violence; and improve community capacity to address all forms of violence. This program supports the enhancement of OJJDP’s youth violence prevention initiatives by inviting OJJDP localities presently implementing the National Forum on Youth Violence Prevention (Forum), Community-Based Violence Prevention (CBVP), and/or the Defending Childhood initiatives to apply for funding to adopt practices and implement models from a different program to achieve their shared violence prevention objectives. This program serves to encourage current initiative sites to enhance, integrate, and align youth violence prevention strategies; coordinate existing resources; engage in community education and outreach; develop and maintain strong collaborations; increase the involvement of youth and families in decision making; and engage the faith community, media, law enforcement, advocates, victim services, business, and other key partners in collective action. These efforts are authorized under Department of Justice Appropriations Act, 2015 (Pub. L. 113-235).

The City of Oakland, CA employs a range of violence prevention programs, including the group-violence reduction initiative under OJJDP’s Community-Based Violence Prevention (CBVP) program and other targeted interventions. However, interventions have reached only 10% of Oakland's active gang members and there are substantial gaps in targeted prevention for thousands of young people affected by or at high-risk for involvement in violence. For the FY15 YVP Enhancement project, Oakland will broaden the reach and effectiveness of violence prevention efforts to develop cross-sector planning and capacity-building to culminate in the creation of a citywide Strategic Violence Prevention and Safety Plan. The project will build on Oakland’s CBVP efforts and advance the planning process with broad cross-sector participation launched by Oakland's Mayor, City Council President, Police Chief, and Schools Superintendent in 2015. The Plan will outline action steps intended to reduce violence and increase community safety citywide. Oakland will focus on serving young people who perpetrate or have been victimized by violence, and on neighborhoods with the highest rates of violent crimes and underlying risk factors. Project goals are to: 1) Complete a communitywide assessment of youth and group-related violence; 2) Develop a Citywide Strategic Violence Prevention and Safety Plan; 3) Develop and implement policies, protocols, and infrastructure for responding to young children affected by violence, and 4) Reduce and prevent youth and gang violence in Oakland.

CA/NCF