The surge in shootings in D.C. in recent years, particularly among young people, has inspired discussions, debates and ideas from various city leaders, but the numbers keep rising and the violence continues to impact families.
On Thursday, D.C. Council member Charles Allen, who chairs the Judiciary and Public Safety Committee, held a roundtable discussion on the Gun Violence Reduction Strategic Plan commissioned by the city and released earlier this year.
Allen said the discussion was an opportunity for experts and D.C. agencies to present the plan, its implementation to date and potential next steps to help reduce gun violence.
David Muhammad, the plan’s lead author and executive director of the National Institute for Criminal Justice Reform, said violence is concentrated among a small group of high-risk people in a narrow geographic area, and that’s where efforts on prevention, intervention and enforcement need to be focused.
“One thing we found in the landscape analysis is, D.C. is not short on resources,” Muhammad said. “The problem is matching the resource to the greatest need.”
Muhammad added that city agencies and leaders need to coordinate and share data to better identify people most at risk for committing violence.
The plan calls for regular in-depth reviews of shootings among representatives from D.C.’s police, courts, jails and the mayor’s office.
The authors also recommend connecting people leaving incarceration with mentors, and that the District should lobby Congress and the White House to fill judicial vacancies to help the backlog of cases in court.
Thomas Apt, a University of Maryland professor and founding director of UMD’s Center for the Study and Practice of Violence Reduction, said research has found that reining in gun violence requires a balance of social programs and law enforcement.
“If you look across the country, no city has arrested their way out of the gun violence challenge — but no city has simply programmed their way out of violence. You must have both,” Apt said.
He explained that the most successful approaches identify those most at risk, engage and stabilize them by addressing their immediate needs, and, once stabilized, treat unhealthy thinking and unsafe behavior through cognitive therapy. Following that, employment and education opportunities should be offered.
“We have to understand that unfortunately, these people based approaches don’t always work. And we do need to punish those who persist in violence with swift and certain sanctions.”
You can read the plan online, and the committee is looking for public comment. Testimony can be sent to Judiciary@dccouncil.gov by Monday, Dec. 19.
