Local and national advocates call on state leaders to prioritize community-based violence intervention, as critical funding was removed for these programs.
Heal 901 and The Community Justice Action Fund asked state leaders to review the impact of cutting funding for community violence interventions in Tennessee’s budget. They have also called on Gov. Bll Lee to find alternative funding for Memphis communities.
The governor’s budget removed a total of $30 million, with half dedicated to workforce development and the other half for crime deterrence in the city.
K. Durell Cowan, founder and director of Heal 901, said this announcement comes at the apex of a “contentious” mayoral election for Shelby County. He said while public safety has been a hot topic for candidates, it’s usually not reflected in the budgets they oversee.
“This work has not been funded at scale for Memphis and Shelby County,” Cowan said.
He noted that the city and county advocate for more officers and deputies, but seem to neglect the strides community-focusde organizations are making in violence intervention and prevention.
Heal 901 is working with national partners to not only stress the need of funding, but to center solutions that address immediate community needs.
Cowan said the two groups have been in partnership for years, as the result of emphasizing violence intervention and prevention in Memphis. He said these conversations focused on studying programs that worked in similar cities while also looking for ways to improve existing programs.
Christina Delgado, national organizing manager for Community Justice Action Fund, noted that the only way to get ahead of violence is to work in collaboration.
The Community Justice Action Fund is a Black-founded and Latino-led national gun violence prevention organization. José Alfaro, executive director of Community Justice Action Fund said they focus solely on communities of color while also championing advocacy and policy-making.
Alfaro said they center the experiences and input of those most impacted by gun violence through their work on a national, state, and local level.
“Communities have been keeping each other safe for generations.” Alfaro said. “Over the last two or three decades, we formalized that into something called community violence prevention or community-based public safety.”
These solutions keep the community at the forefront to stop violence before it starts. This approach also seeks to address social determinants of health.
‘We cannot police our way out of this,” Delgado said. “ We cannot incarcerate our way out of this public health crisis. We have to be able to treat the root causes. We have to be able to treat the people and find out what it is they need and connect them to these resources.”
Cowan emphasized violence as “the tip of the iceburg” as it’s often the result of disinvestment and systemic issues. He said as one of the most impoverished cities in the country, Memphis has become a “petri dish” for crime and violence.
By implementing strategies that other cities have seen success in, Cowan said Memphis has the opportunity to “set the tone” for the rest of the south. Delgado added that community-based intervention programs not only help those who have been victims of violence, but those who are in close proximity to those who have been harmed.
She said community members are “credible messengers” with “historic and generational” connections to neighborhoods, and have solutions that law enforcement don’t.
“It is a full ecosystem that has to have all the working pieces in order for us to create these roadmaps, policies, [and] practices and really establish public safety for each and every one of these communities,” Delgado said.
The groups said success is measure in increased funding, but also by prioritizing these initiatives as both public safety and health.