Will violence interrupters work in Prince George’s County?
On Feb. 28, Prince George’s County announced a multi-pronged approach aimed at reversing the increase in the number of violent crimes committed by kids.
While the problem isn’t just unique to the county, leaders are hopeful that a collective of intervention efforts will have an impact by targeting kids before they commit crimes.
County Executive Angela Alsobrooks announced one of the newest tools used in the fight: a violence prevention task force.
“Each of them comes from across Prince George’s County,” said Alsobrooks, speaking on the task force’s members. They “come from all walks of life as well, ranging from community activists [to] teachers, veterans, and even parents of gun violence victims.”
Their job is to identify areas where the need to mitigate violence are known and urgent.
This task force is the county’s version of violence interrupters, which is a tool that has drawn criticism in other parts of the region. At best, the results can be hard to quantify, though critics argue the reason there’s no evidence of their successes is because they aren’t successful.
But supporters of the program says the county’s efforts will be modeled off a similar initiative in Oakland, California, which they claim has proven effective, despite homicides in Oakland reaching an eight-year high last year.
Euniesha Davis, the county’s director of community relations, said the task force will take “a targeted approach, a holistic approach,” in its work. That means approaching at-risk kids at school and at home, including through their parents and showing them different ways to resolve conflicts.
“Being able to provide options to students, I think that’s one of the biggest problems that they may not be aware of the opportunities that exist, of the options that they have,” Davis said.
“Being able to… speak to the kids [and] get down to the heart of the matter why [they’re] creating those issues,” she added, “but also saying ‘OK, now there are some solutions for you, there are some opportunities for you,’ and we just think that it’s going to work.”
But Alsobrooks made clear the task force is just one tool – not the only tool – that can be an effective solution.
“We recognize that this problem is complex and that it requires a complex solution,” said Alsobrooks.
She also pointed out that this isn’t her first time working to combat rising crime rates either.
“When I came to office in 2010 we saw crime in a particular place,” she said. “A number of us came together and we were able to see a 50 percent reduction in crime over those years and how did it happen? It happened because we made investments,” she said, speaking of a number of programs like the anti-truancy effort “I Belong Here” and juvenile offender diversion program Teen Court.
“But we also held people accountable… all of those things were things that we did alongside holding the people who couldn’t be convinced that way, holding them accountable and that’s why I said it has to be multiple approaches.”
