Our Policy Work

In addition to partnering with cities, we mine the lessons learned from our partnerships and projects, and use them to strengthen public state policy. 

Here are some of the results that have come from our policy work: 

• Reygan Cunningham, from CPSC, shared valuable insights during the Giffords’ Community Violence Intervention Conference. The event brought together experts, researchers, and practitioners to discuss the current state of Community Violence Intervention (CVI) strategies. Reygan emphasized the need to expand the CVI field’s focus from individual models to effective city-wide strategies. Despite funding and adopting evidence-informed CVI programs, few cities have successfully reduced community violence. To address this, CPSC collaborated with leading experts, with the support of Pew Charitable Trusts, to identify key capacities essential for success.
  
  • https://thecapartnership.org/policy-work/understanding-key-capacities-for-community-violence-intervention/

• In 2015, our work with the Oakland and Stockton police departments developed into a partnership with the California Department of Justice and Stanford University that offered the first POST-certified Implicit Bias and Procedural Justice training in the United States, spurring major changes in police training throughout California.
  • https://oag.ca.gov/news/press-releases/attorney-general-kamala-d-harris-kicks-first-its-kind-law-enforcement-training
• Since 2019, CPSC and the Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence have convened and supported a statewide coalition (The CALVIP Coalition) that helped develop the $227 million California Violence Intervention and Prevention (CalVIP) competitive grant program and pass the California Break the Cycle of Violence Act.
  • https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billNavClient.xhtml?bill_id=201920200AB1603
  • https://www.bscc.ca.gov/s_cpgpcalvipgrant/
  • https://giffords.org/press-release/2021/05/ca-gov-gavin-newsom-proposes-new-investments-in-community-violence-intervention/
• Bay Area Regional Approach. With support from Kaiser Permanente and the U.S. Department of Justice, CPSC and the National Institute for Criminal Justice Reform are working with community intervention, police and city leaders from a range of Bay Area cities including San Francisco, Oakland, Stockton, Richmond and Antioch, California. This project seeks to understand and reduce serious violence (shootings) related to cross-city violence dynamics.
• CPSC served on the Council on Criminal Justice Violent Crime Working Group, helping to develop a unified framework for essential steps city leaders can take now to address the national spike in gun violence since 2020.
  • https://counciloncj.org/violent-crime-working-group/
  • https://counciloncj.org/10-essential-actions/
• In partnership with Professor Anthony Braga, we are supporting the analysis of illegal gun markets that provide firearms used in shootings in multiple Bay Area cities. This project will both systematically map the flow of illegal firearms into and within these cities with a focus on those used in firearms crimes; but will also seek to better understand the growing role of personally manufactured firearms (PMFs) in local street violence.
• As part of the Ballmer Groups’ Investment in Community Violence Intervention Initiative (CVI), CPSC currently works in partnership with NICJR; Cities United; The Community-Based Public Safety Collective, The Health Alliance for Violence Intervention and Advance Peace to develop and implement a unified CVI framework in 12 major cities over the next five years.
  • https://www.thehavi.org/ballmer-group-awards-18million-for-community-violence-intervention