The community received the first glimpse Monday of how the Cure Violence Global program works and how it could be implemented in Peoria.
In a presentation at the Peoria Public Library’s main branch, Cure Violence Global CEO Dr. Fredrick Echols outlined the assessment process the city is currently undergoing and what the programs afterwards would look like.
Echols said that Cure Violence is based around treating violence as a disease and attacking the root causes from a public health perspective.
“We look at the landscape across America, those communities that suffer the most from acts of violence, those communities have high levels of poverty, low education attainment, low job opportunities, low access to quality health and social services.” said Echols. “So, it's really important for us as we engage individuals at a higher risk to identify what their true needs are.”
Echols said if they can meet those needs, it puts high risk individuals on a better life path, stopping potential violence in the moment and in the future. The Cure Violence program aims to accomplish this by coordinating with community organizations to hire and train “interrupters,” people who have been impacted by or involved in violence themselves who are looking to make a change.
“We have to have the right participants,” said Demeatreas Whatley, a program specialist for Cure Violence Global. “Those who are alleged gang bangers, those who are alleged shooters and perpetrators of violence. Those who are involved with these cliques and alleged high risk activities. Those are the people we’re talking about. If you’re talking to high risk participants, you will see a reduction in crime, a reduction in shootings in your community.”
The hiring process for these individuals includes an initial pre-screening, where Cure Violence representatives will meet them, interview them and take a walk with them through their neighborhood to gauge how ingrained they are in the community. After that, potential Interrupters will go before a “hiring panel” consisting of community leaders, organizers, law enforcement and city officials. But Cure Violence interrupters are not police informants. The program does not directly report to or work with law enforcement.
“I think it's more like a trust and mutual understanding,” said Ricardo “Cobe” Williams ,director of U.S. Programs for Cure Violence Global. “You know, like, they do what they do, we got to do what we got to do. But you will not see the interrupters and outreach workers out there, like Dr. Echols was saying, seeming like they’re real close with police, law enforcement, all that.”
Once these interrupters and outreach workers are hired, they’ll focused on a small number of hot spots, referred to as catchment areas, where gun violence is highest. Echols said the program aims to lower the amount of crime in these areas by having the Interrupters and outreach workers directly intervene, and in doing so cause a ripple effect across the city.
Cure Violence has been running these programs since the early 2000’s in cities like Chicago, St. Louis, Baltimore and New York City.Echols said repeated evaluations of the program’s effectiveness usually last around three years to ensure thorough data.
Before any of this can happen, Peoria will need to undergo an assessment. This consists of four parts:
- Cure Violence 101 presentations, like the nine happening across the city over the next few days
- Key stakeholder meetings with community and neighborhood leaders, city officials, law enforcement and nonprofits
- Meetings with potential workers for outreach and interruption
- Reporting back to the city with a budget and a plan for implementation
Typically, Echols said, this process takes around two weeks.
Public Health Administrator Monica Hendrickson, from the Peoria City/County Health Department, said the department is currently funding the $25,000 assessment process, after the city council voted to forgo funding the assessment. After that, it will have to come from other sources.
“We're gonna be looking at some different mixed models of funding,” she said. “There's funding from the city, they released some RFPs related to violence reduction. We know there's even state funding, and then we're gonna look at some foundations as well. Just because, you know, this is, again, a community based decision and process.”
In total, between hiring, implementation and tracking data, the Cure Violence Program could take years to see come to fruition in Peoria. But Hendrickson said when it comes to public health and evidence based practice, you don’t want to rush it.
“What we are really hoping is, especially over this next, you know, nine sessions in total is that people get an understanding of what Cure Violence is meant to be,” she said. “And really what it's meant to be is an effective evidence based program that we would like to implement with fidelity.”
You can find a full list of those upcoming meetings on the health department’s home page by clicking here.
