Oakland Community Organizations has won support from city officials for an Oakland Strategy for Violence Prevention and Intervention. The inititative to stem rising levels of violence and homicide in Oakland is based on a successful intervention model developed in Boston. Now OCO is helping community leaders learn how they can make the initiative work in their neighborhoods.

A meeting with Rev. Brown from Boston, Rev. Burch from San Francisco, Anne Marks from the Department of Human Services, and Lenore Anderson, the new Director of Public Safety, was an opportunity for leaders to strategize and consult on how the community can be hands-on in the implementation of the Strategy, and to build unity and coordination through relationships from the ground up.

Leaders walked a West Oakland neighborhood earlier in the evening with their guests to practice basic outreach: talking with young people in the streets, learning about their needs, and getting to know them. They felt empowered and energized by the experience. Brown, Burch, Marks and Anderson all underscored that for a street-based outreach approach to be successful in Oakland, it is important for the community to play a critical role in leadership and being in collaboration. Leaders learned that a practice of street-based outreach works to affect all levels of crime in a community, and is part of developing a longer-term solution to violence by creating mentorship, guidance for younger people, connecting them to employment and education opportunities, and other areas of promise.

Anderson said that Mayor Dellums is dedicated to street-based outreach as a strategy for violence prevention. OCO leaders want to make sure that there are more trained street outreach workers who will collaborate and start hitting the streets soon.

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