CVG has been a leader in making communities safer and 2022 has been our most groundbreaking year!
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Cure Violence Global’s Top 5 Accomplishments in 2022

For more than 25 years, Cure Violence Global has been a leader in making communities safer and 2022 has been our most groundbreaking year yet!

First, the Cure Violence approach has significantly expanded across the United States with nine new cities establishing new Cure Violence sites, including Memphis, Louisville, and Winston-Salem. Many current city partners, after seeing the results, have expanded or are working to expand their Cure Violence programs, including Atlanta, Charlotte, and Washington, DC. 

Second, in 2022 there have been big investments in the Cure Violence approach in Latin America. In Central America, UNICEF is partnering with Cure Violence Global to expand the approach in Mexico and Honduras.

To read the rest of the article, please go to Cure Violence Global’s Top 5 Accomplishments in 2022.

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Interview with Cure Violence Global CEO, Dr. Fredrick Echols

 

"By implementing a community-centered approach, we give community members a voice in the process."

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You have been CEO for Cure Violence Global for six months now. What are some of the highlights? 

The biggest highlight for me has been working with and getting to know the Cure Violence Global team members.  Many individuals think that the organization has hundreds or thousands of staff, but it’s really only 20-to-30 full-time staff who work tirelessly each day to help communities implement the Cure Violence model. Each member is dedicated to achieving the mission of the organization, because they believe that the model works and have seen it work in communities across the world. This life-changing and life-saving work is dangerous, and it requires a lot of energy and passion.  Yet, every team member is fully dedicated and committed to this work. I am truly honored and blessed to have the opportunity to work with and pour into them to help create the change the world needs. 


I know part of what you've done in the last six months has been visiting sites and I think you have visited more than a dozen sites. What have you learned from these site visits?

Well, one thing I took from the site visits is that every community is different. Every community has its own set of cultural nuances, its own set of infrastructure issues, and its own set of government issues. And so, having a model that can be tailored to meet the needs of each community is important. By implementing a community-centered approach, we give community members a voice in the process.  We take the information they share with us and use that to inform how the program is implemented. This helps ensure we don't cause additional harm to communities and instead uplift each community in a way that's sustainable and empowering. And so, whether we’re working in Colombia, Mexico, Missouri, Georgia, or New York, we work tirelessly to ensure the program is tailored to meet the needs of each community where the model is being implemented. As more jurisdictions engage Cure Violence Global, we will utilize the same approach and methodology to make sure that we implement a community-centered approach and leverage resources across the available infrastructure.

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There is more to the interview, including a harrowing story of Dr. Echols’ first trip to Honduras.  “The protesters blocked the roads. I was kind of afraid for my life.”

Hear how the story ends and learn more about the new leader of Cure Violence Global in the full interview.

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Cure Violence Global Announces New Partnerships with AAA-ICDR, The Just Trust and UNICEF

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The Cure Violence movement keeps growing nationally and globally. CVG recently launched three new projects, which will redefine and reimagine public safety. 

  • A new partnership with the American Arbitration Association-International Centre for Dispute Resolution (AAA-ICDR) will work across the field of Community Violence Prevention to develop the next generation violence prevention trainings (read more).

  • CVG has been selected,  as one of eight organizations nationwide, to participate in the inaugural class of The Just Trust’s Safer Communities Accelerator program. The Accelerator serves to nourish a growing community of organizations that are advancing innovative models for preventing crime, repairing harm, increasing accountability, and building stronger, safer communities.

  • A partnership with UNICEF Mexico expands CVG’s current work in Ciudad Juárez and adapts the Cure Violence approach to two new areas: the states of Michoacan and Guerrero.  Additionally, the UNICEF and CVG training addressing gender-based violence, femicide, and violence against women and girls will be expanded to all sites in the project (read more).

The Evidence on Cure Violence

Violence is the third leading cause of death in the United States for people under 45 years old according to the CDC. Much of the violence is concentrated in low-income, communities of color, with African American people dying by violence at seven times the rate of White people.  This trend holds globally. United Nations data indicates that more than 450,000 people are killed each year across the world, predominantly in impoverished areas with racial and ethnic minority populations.

To combat this global crisis, communities urgently need evidence-based approaches to preventing violence that have a track record of success.  As a resource to the field of community violence intervention and policymakers, Cure Violence Global (CVG) recently released an updated version of The Evidence of Effectiveness, a report detailing evaluations and studies on the Cure Violence approach. This updated version adds several new and recently discovered evaluations.  

The new report includes 22 analyses of the Cure Violence approach from sites around the world, each providing evidence of effectiveness.  The studies cover Cure Violence sites across four continents and eight countries, including four countries in Latin America. Findings reveal that sites in the US have been associated with significant reductions in shootings, including a 63% reduction in the South Bronx neighborhood in New York City and a 56% reduction in the Central City neighborhood in New Orleans. Similarly, programs in Latin America have had reductions in killings, including a 47% reduction in Charco Azul in Cali, Colombia.

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To read the rest of the article and to download the report, please click on the following link: The Evidence on Cure Violence.

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Adapting the Cure Violence Approach to Prevent Political Violence 

Acts of violence inspired by hatred based on race, ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation, or political beliefs are on the rise. The Pacific Northwest has been a hotbed for this type of violence for more than a century, and in the last few decades, there have been a growing number of individuals involved in groups dedicated to extremist ideology.

Few options have been available to communities to prevent extremist violence beyond policing and security, which is essential, but not enough.  To identify and develop new approaches, the US Department of Homeland Security developed a grant-funded program to support innovative ideas to approach this persistent and growing problem. 

In 2021, CVG was awarded a two-year federally funded innovation grant to apply its public health approach to the realm of violent extremism in the Pacific Northwest. The project is a partnership with Parallel Networks and local consultants and uses a data-driven approach to identify hotspots for violent extremist activity and recruitment. 

Over the course of this year, CVG and partners have established a helpline for people concerned someone they know is at risk for involvement in extremist violence and have conducted workshops on stopping political violence. In the next few months, the CVG team will conduct trainings around de-escalation, transformative dialogue, trauma-informed care, as well as raise awareness of the risk factors and indicators of someone radicalizing to violence and how to have difficult conversations with them to prevent the risk of violence. 

Through trainings, community dialogue sessions, and more community events, CVG is building a local prevention framework whereby community members are not only aware of the issue of individuals radicalizing to violence, but are equipped with skills and resources to prevent people from actually committing acts of violence.

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Cure Violence Partners Profile:
Stand Up SA

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Dr. Echols made a recent visit to San Antonio, TX to meet CVG partner Stand Up SA.  Cure Violence Global began working with San Antonio in 2015 to implement a Cure Violence approach across four communities.  Killings dropped by more than 40% in the first year.  Since then, the team in San Antonio has developed additional support for participants to address long-standing needs and provide access to resources for long-term solutions that will improve quality of life and reduce the risk of recidivism. Today, the San Antonio site employs 23 staff to interrupt conflicts, work with the highest risk to change behaviors, and connect people to needed services.

CLICK HERE to watch the video!

Cali, Colombia Implements Citywide Cure Violence Program with Support from the Business Community

In a world full of violent cities, Cali, Colombia stands out. A city of 2.4 million people, it has more than 1,200 killings a year and has consistently been atop the annual lists of most violent cities in the world. Cali is known as a central city for the international drug cartels and there is a culture of open involvement in the drug trade. It is estimated that half of the city’s residents live in areas of high violence.

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Cure Violence began in Cali in 2017 in two of the most violent communities – Charco Azul and Comuneros. An evaluation of the pilot found a 47% and 30% reduction in killings, respectively. This success helped pave the way for expansion. 

In 2021 and 2022, with funding from the private business sector in Cali, over 100 violence interrupters were hired to cover 50 areas of the city. The approach additionally includes 400 volunteer interrupters that create a network of credible members of the community to support each violence interrupter. These volunteers are the eyes and ears of the lead interrupter, helping to detect conflicts and identify the right methods to stop the conflicts from becoming violent. 

This investment has brought a substantial increase in violence prevention efforts.  So far in 2022, there have been 6,837 conflicts interrupted, a 522% increase from 2021. Cure Violence staff in Cali have spent more than 57,000 hours interrupting conflict in 2022, and more than 24,000 hours working to change behavior of the highest risk.

To read more about the approach in Cali, please click on the following link: Cali work at the CVG blog.

To watch the video, please click on the following link: Cali work on YouTube.

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Your tax-deductible support powers the Cure Violence movement in cities across the US and countries around the globe, renewing hope and joy to the hardest-hit communities.  Your partnership with Cure Violence Global saves thousands of lives. Join us.
We need you!


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All gifts received by December 31, 2022 will be tripled, thanks to a generous, longtime Cure Violence supporter. Your impact goes three times as far. Thank you. We cannot do this work without YOU! 

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