America’s approach to public safety is overdue for transformation. For too long, we’ve responded to violence with fear, social control, surveillance, and systems that react after harm has already been done. But what if safety could be built before the crisis? What if we invested in peace as deliberately as we invest in punishment?
In 2006, community members and city officials in the city of Richmond, California were grappling with these pressing questions. For over two decades, gun violence had a stranglehold on this Bay Area city of nearly 100,000 residents, with an alarming average of 35 firearm related homicides per year. By the end of 2006, the city had witnessed 42 homicides and 186 non-fatal shootings where bullets entered bodies. By the end of 2007, the numbers had surged even more to 47 homicides and 242 gunshot wounds among Richmond residents.
In late 2007, the Richmond community reached a breaking point. City leaders responded boldly by implementing a groundbreaking and innovative approach to public safety. They established the Richmond Office of Neighborhood Safety (ONS), a commitment by city policy and administrative leaders to ensure that gun violence in Richmond became a rare and non-recurring occurrence. This recognition acknowledged that policing alone could not or would never solve this seemingly intractable problem.
Over the next sixteen years, the ONS would play a pivotal role in transforming Richmond’s public safety landscape. By 2023, the city had achieved the lowest homicide rate in recorded history, with eight homicides. Additionally, the city had witnessed a remarkable reduction in non-fatal shootings, with 37 incidents. These reductions began in 2010, marking the city’s first significant homicide reduction record in 2014 (13). Since then, Richmond has continued to make progress, solidifying its commitment to a safer community.
This five-part series explores how Community Violence Intervention (CVI) offers a bold, proven, and people-centered approach to ending cycles of gun violence and reimagining public safety from the ground up.
Let me be clear, the important and necessary work of CVI is not an alternative—it is a public safety advancement. CVI reaches those at the center of the violence with care, credibility, and resolute commitment. This is prevention, intervention, healing, and hope—all rooted in community.
Across this series, we’ll examine:
- Why CVI must take center stage in helping to define public safety’s future in cities most impacted by retaliatory gun violence
- What makes CVI distinct from policing and traditional social services
- Who the frontline peacebuilders are, and why they deserve investment
- What measurable value CVI brings to cities and communities
- How policymakers can create the conditions for CVI to endure and grow
This is more than a policy conversation—it’s a public safety imperative. Join us as we elevate the people, practices, and policies that are making peace possible—and permanent.
A further side note about vision and leadership: It takes courage when under fire. Richmond’s decision to bring Community Violence Intervention (CVI) into the heart of city government wasn’t just bold—it was historic. Allow me to be frank, this move didn’t happen in a vacuum. It came under fire from powerful interests committed to the way things have always been. For city leaders to stay the course, they had to resist the strong temptation to retreat, to fold under pressure, to play it safe. In Richmond, they did. Under the leadership of then City Manager Bill Lindsay, the city moved with courage over tough terrain. They stood firm in the belief that saving lives required new muscle and a new mandate. Richmond’s CVI integration is more than a public safety reform—it’s a testament to what’s possible when leadership decides to lead.
Upon my departure from city government, Bill would caution me, “as you move forward to help other cities facilitate this essential CVI advancement, you are going to be told no, for all the wrong reasons by people in leadership in many of those cities who have the power and responsibility to make the tough decisions.” Sadly, he was right.
Part One: Making Peace the Priority—A New Vision for Public Safety (something representing leading forward)
Redefining Public Safety: Why CVI Must be Prominent in Leading the Way Forward
For decades, public safety in America has been narrowly defined—anchored in policing, incarceration, and emergency response. But the landscape of harm has shifted. The drivers of violence have evolved. And the communities most impacted are asking a different question: not just how do we respond to violence? —but how do we stop it before it starts?
This is where a permanently funded infrastructure that supports Community Violence Intervention (CVI) comes in.
CVI should not be interpreted as a replacement for traditional public safety—it’s a redefinition of it. At its core, CVI is about preventing violence by reaching those at the highest risk before a gun is fired, before a life is lost, and before trauma and harm spreads. It is a proactive, relational, and community-rooted approach that centers healing and accountability over punishment and isolation.
This series is about putting CVI where it belongs—at the center of a modern, humane, and effective public safety system.
From the Margins to the Mainstream
Too often, CVI has been treated as an “alternative” or “add-on.” But it isn’t an alternative—it’s an answer. It’s an answer born from experience, grounded in relationships, and backed by real-world results. Other cities that have embraced CVI—like Milwaukee WI; Orlando FL; Fort Worth, TX; and Lansing MI—are seeing measurable reductions in gun violence and long-term changes in community trust.
“CVI” as we know it is not a pilot anymore. It’s a proven public safety practice that needs to be scaled, supported, and acknowledged as a publicly funded necessity in our most impacted cities.
A Different Kind of Public Safety Leader
CVI is led by people with deep credibility and high character in the communities they serve. Violence interrupters, mentors, and outreach workers are not just practitioners—they are peacebuilders. They engage with individuals who have been written off and go underserved and/or unserved by other systems. They de-escalate and manage conflicts that could turn deadly. They offer pathways to transformation when all other doors have closed. I want to say here that I believe that to be a good CVI leader (regardless of your role), you must be a good person. There is no way around this important truth.
This is labor-intensive, high-stakes work. And yet, CVI professionals often operate without the recognition, competitive compensation, or protections afforded to other public safety workers. This must change if this element of public safety is to effectively mature and endure.
What This Series Will Explore
Over the next four posts, we’ll dive into what makes CVI unique, necessary, and worthy of serious investment:
- Part Two: How CVI shifts the focus from response to prevention.
- Part Three: Why the CVI workforce is one of the most critical and under-supported assets in public safety.
- Part Four: The financial and social return cities gain when they invest in CVI.
- Part Five: What local, state, and federal policymakers must do now to make CVI permanent.
The old playbook of public safety is failing too many people, in too many places. CVI is not new (although the name may be), it offers a time-tested public safety approach—one that centers dignity, accountability, and healing. Where gun violence is prevalent, it is now time to lead with CVI.