Community-based safety strategies being used in Tucson are getting a boost due to a national initiative focused on violence prevention.
The work being done here as part of the “Scaling Safety” initiative was the focus of a meeting here last week between community groups and government leaders.
Tucson is one of five cities in the country chosen to participate in the initiative that was developed jointly by the Community Based Public Safety Collective (CBPSC) and the Alliance for Safety and Justice (ASJ), said Shundrea Trotty, the ASJ's organizational department director. The other cities are Austin; Jackson, Mississippi; Miami and Cleveland.
Shundrea Trotty, of Alliance for Safety and Justice, talks Thursday about Scaling Safety, a national effort to help community groups with anti-crime efforts. Tucson is one of five cities in the program.
The initiative aims to expand and strengthen community-based safety strategies proven to prevent violence, support victims and survivors “and center those most at-risk of experiencing harm,” she said.
Tucson was chosen because it “stood out nationally” for two reasons, Trotty said: The city’s leadership and its strong community efforts on the issues already.
Tucson Mayor Regina Romero launched the Safe City Initiative in October. It aims to put the city and other local jurisdictions' efforts under one umbrella, identify gaps in local crime-fighting efforts and "leverage" law enforcement action and treatment options to address those gaps.
"Our Safe City Initiative is addressing the root causes of violence and taking meaningful action to prevent it. We don't want to wait until people get hurt to take action," Romero said. "Violence prevention is a shared responsibility, and Tucson is leading the country in this collaborative effort with our community programs, with law enforcement, local businesses and non-profits."
“Our work begins with a simple understanding ... safety does not happen through one system alone. It happens when prevention, intervention and enforcement work together, community organizations build relationships and interrupt violence before it escalates, cities align strategy and resources, and when these pieces work together, communities are stronger and safer,” Trotty said.
Brittany Petersen, violence prevention coordinator for the Tucson Police Department, a national initiative being used here that helps fund government and community programs that help with violence prevention.
“Scaling safety focuses on strengthening the prevention and intervention side of that ecosystem. Our work is complementary to policing, not a replacement for it,” she said. “Prevention strategies help reduce the likelihood that violence occurs in the first place, allowing the entire public safety system to function more effectively.”
Partnering with Tucson police and city officials, Scaling Safety allows for more effective intervention, said Lance Meeks, vice president of community engagement for Goodwill Industries of Southern Arizona. He said Goodwill's workforce development programming helps the groups focus on the lives of young people, a much-needed area to target in terms of violence prevention and interruption.
“One of our values is that, we benefit the communities that we operate in. And so in 2023 ... we took on the opportunity to lead out on the first community violence intervention program, which we call The Village," Meeks said.
Work at The Village centers on interrupting criminal activity in young adult populations, according to Brittany Petersen, the Tucson Police Department's violence prevention coordinator. Last year, she said, nearly half of all homicide and shooting suspects were under 25 years old.
Partnering with police and city officials allows for more effective intervention, said Lance Meeks, vice president of community engagement for Goodwill Industries of Southern Arizona.
Tucson police made more than 400 referrals of young people to The Village in the first 21 months of its operation, Petersen said.
"Those are young people that they've met and seen that have been arrested, and there's been progress," Petersen said, noting that Tucson saw a 14% decrease in homicides and an 18% decrease in non-fatal shootings last year, compared to the year prior.
"It truly takes all of us, it's not one organization or agency ... It's really becoming an opportunity for us to really continue to work with those young people on a daily basis, to ensure that our community is safe," Meeks said.
