Abstract:
In 1995, Dr. Gary Slutkin of the University of Illinois at Chicago developed the CeaseFire program to reduce youth violence associated with firearms. CeaseFire is a multifaceted intervention involving several different components. Most notably, street outreach workers – often former gang members – develop relationships with high risk youth in high crime urban areas. Outreach workers serve as positive role models for the young people, steering them to resources such as job or educational training. Special outreach staff called violence interrupters work to identify and resolve potentially dangerous conflicts before they escalate into shootings. In addition, the program organizes community responses to shootings and attempts to change social norms surrounding shootings, sending the message that using a gun to resolve conflict is unacceptable. A grant from the U.S. Department of Justice enabled the Baltimore City Health Department (BCHD) to attempt to replicate Chicago’s CeaseFire in Baltimore under the name Safe Streets. The evaluation [of the Safe Streets program] has four major components: 1) a review of implementation data for the program; 2) an analysis of the effects of the program on homicides and nonfatal shootings; 3) a community survey of attitudes toward gun violence; and 4) interviews with Safe Streets program participants to ascertain their perceptions of the program’s effects on their lives. (Author text)