Press

Spurred by the killings of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor at the hands of police, New York is just one city where protesters are calling for money to be diverted from police budgets to the community. Mayor Bill de Blasio added $10 million of funding for community groups running alternative-to-policing programs, including Save Our Streets.

According to the U.S. Census Bureau, one out of every four children in this country does not have a father living with them in their home. TODAY’s Craig Melvin visits UPNEXT, a fatherhood program at our Midtown Community Court, to talk with non-custodial dads, like Harry, who re-connected with his daughter after being incarcerated.

After an uptick in shootings across Brooklyn, dozens of anti-gun violence advocates, including Save Our Streets, gathered the community to speak out against gun violence. “We look at violence, especially gun violence, as a public health issue and not a criminal issue,” said Shadoe Tarver, our associate director of community safety. 

Gun violence has risen in cities across the U.S. this summer, compounding the issues of systemic racism, intergenerational trauma, and the ongoing coronavirus pandemic. Nonprofit Quarterly explores research-backed solutions to gun violence, including violence interruption programs like our Save Our Streets, which approaches gun violence as a public health issue.

"In New York City, one study found that gun violence rates declined significantly in two neighborhoods operating violence interruption programs." The Appeal cites our Save Our Streets program in the Bronx as one way to reduce the footprint of police and create safer communities. 

Violence prevention groups like Save Our Streets will help lead the efforts toward ending gun violence in Brooklyn, with a goal to "saturate the community with the violence interrupters and outreach workers and all the members of the cure violence team,” said Ife Charles, our deputy director for S.O.S.

All communities want to be free from violence, but that doesn't mean all communities want more police. Shadoe Tarver, associate director of safety at Save Our Streets, Bed-Stuy, talk about community based models for public safety. 

Anti-violence and community-based organizations in New York City present an alternative approach to public safety. Save Our Streets "helped reduce shootings in the South Bronx area where they work by sixty-three per cent," the New Yorker reports in a profile of our work.

Art is a powerful vehicle for racial and social justice. Project Reset partners with Brooklyn Museum to offer individuals with low-level cases the chance to dispose of the case through the study and creation of art that explores perspectives. In this video, teaching artist, Sophia Dawson, and two participants, Denagee and Aristides, share their experiences with NBCLX.

"Climate change is racial injustice." Taking that as their topic, students in our Brooklyn-based Restorative Justice in Schools program placed first out of 2,200 submissions in NPR's Student Podcast Challenge. Read more about the students, and hear their award-winning episode, in this NPR profile. "Racism is like a tree," explains one of the students, "and police brutality and environmental racism are just a couple of branches off that giant tree."