Independent Evaluation Supports Violence Prevention Effort

January 13, 2009. The Baltimore City Health Department is releasing an independent interim evaluation of the violence prevention program Safe Streets by Dr. Daniel Webster and his colleagues at the Center for the Prevention of Youth Violence at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. Safe Streets is modeled on the program Ceasefire Chicago. [Press Release] [Interim Evaluation of Baltimore's Safe Streets Program] [Letter from Dr. Daniel Webster] [Letter from Chicago CeaseFire]

Mayor Dixon Announces Safe Streets Expansion

August 8, 2008. Mayor Sheila Dixon and Baltimore City Health Commissioner Dr. Joshua Sharfstein were joined by advocates, donors, and city employees to announce the plan to expand the community anti-violence program Safe Streets. The planned expansion is funded by private and public money, and will allow the program to operate through June 30, 2009. [Press Release]

Mayor Dixon Launches Safe Streets Weekend

June 13, 2008. Mayor Sheila Dixon joined the Baltimore City Health Department’s Office of Youth Violence Prevention to announce the City’s first Safe Streets Weekend. The goal is to inform the city about public health efforts to reduce gun violence. [Press Release]

Health Department Announces Safe Streets Grant Opportunity

May 21, 2008. The Health Department is announcing a Request for Proposals for community organizations to implement Safe Streets, a community-based intervention program focused on reducing shootings and homicides. Community organizations in areas with high rates of violent crime are eligible to apply. [Press Release] [Safe Streets RFP] [Safe Streets Webpage]

Mayor Sheila Dixon Announces First Operation Safe Streets Grant Award - [Press Release]

Over the past four years, over 3,000 Baltimore residents have been shot or killed.  To address this problem the Office of Youth Violence Prevention is launching Operation Safe Streets.  The Office will select two community-based organizations to initiate the program in two high-risk communities in April 2007.  The program is funded by a grant from the United States Department of Justice Office of Justice Programs. 

Operation Safe Streets is a community mobilization and outreach program designed to combat shootings and homicides. This intervention targets at risk youth aged 14 to 25, though outreach and service connection, and the community as a whole, through a media campaign and community mobilization.

Operation Safe Streets replicates Ceasefire Chicago, a highly successful program created by the School of Public Health at the University of Illinois at Chicago.  The CeaseFire model is based on five core components: community coalition building, street outreach to at risk youth, public education, clergy involvement, and law enforcement collaboration.  In its first year of operation in high violence communities in Chicago, CeaseFire achieved reductions in shootings and homicides of between 25% and 67%.  The model is well suited to neighborhoods in Baltimore with the highest rates of shootings and homicide. 

For more information on CeaseFire, please visit the CeaseFire Chicago website.  For more information about Operation Safe Streets, please contact the Office of Youth Violence Prevention.