The Annie E. Casey Foundation reports that shootings fell by as much as 73% in communities implementing Cure Violence, an international gun violence-prevention model focused on social inequities and relying on input from people most impacted by gun violence.
The foundation’s recently released report, "Improving Community Safety Through Public Health Strategies: Lessons from Atlanta and Milwaukee," spotlights Cure Violence projects it is underwriting in those two cities. There, according to Casey:
- The number of shootings in Milwaukee fell to 98 in 2019 from 119 in 2017.
- 500 referrals resulted in gun-violence interrupters from Milwaukee's the Blueprint and 414LIFE visiting shooting victims — mostly 18- to 35-year-old men — in the hospital, part of efforts to prevent retaliatory shootings.
- Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms this year earmarked $5 million in taxpayer funds to expand Neighborhood Planning Unit V, that city's version of Cure Violence, to more neighborhoods.
- 400 Atlantans have been engaged during twice monthly healing circles for gun violence victims, survivors and their relatives since January 2019.
- Trauma-responders in Atlanta had shown up, at least 20 times, at homes of gun-violence victims within 48 hours of a shooting. Those responses are, by turns, a complement and counterpoint to police officers' main focus on identifying the shooters.
"Because gun violence is symptomatic of larger social and racial inequities," the Casey Foundation wrote, "communities will require a multi-pronged approach to safety that is rooted in research and driven by its members. The Casey Foundation supports approaches that incorporate an assessment of both risk and resilience factors at the community level and that tackle underlying causes, interrupt situations likely to result in violence and promote community-wide healing and support."
The Casey-funded projects are based partly on the construct, achievements of and challenges confronting CeaseFire-Chicago.