Gun violence among African American and Latino youth remains unacceptably high in the United States despite the fact that most violence is preventable. The burden on certain communities is alarmingly high and requires immediate attention.
In 2010, Dr. Deanna Wilkinson lead an effort to establish a CeaseFire program in Columbus, Ohio. The long-term goal of the initiative is to reduce shootings and killings in high-violence target areas by changing social norms and disrupting transmission of violent behavior from person to person, thus breaking the intergenerational cycle of violence. Growing out of the efforts of the OSU YVPAB, the CeaseFire Columbus has been modeled closely after the Chicago CeaseFire model which is grounded in a public health behavioral change model focusing resources on high risk individuals, neighborhoods, and events. There are six core components that work in tandem:
- Community Mobilization: Mobilize and empower the community to engage informal social control through collective responses to violence, participation in community events, block-level organizing and more. Celebrate non-violence! Celebrate life!
- Public Education Campaign: Violence is preventable! We will spread strong anti-violence public education messages; implement anti-violence events and unify the community around prevention. Lend your creative talents to the CeaseFire Columbus initiative!
- Faith Leadership in this Peace Movement: We will partner with faith leaders and the faith community to provide spiritual leadership, open churches as safe havens, and to spread awareness that violence is not acceptable in our community.
- Street Outreach and Conflict Mediation: We will establish street outreach and violence interrupter services to target area youth (14-26) who are at high risk of being shot or being a shooter. If you know a young person who needs a reason to change make a referral to CeaseFire Columbus!
- Partnerships with Social service providers, criminal justice system professionals, and health care providers
- Data Driven Solutions and Evaluation of our Efforts: We will carefully analyze changes in patterns of gun violence including hot spots and retaliatoryhomicides. We will collect data on shootings and murders from the Columbus Division of Police. The OSU research team will work closely with our community partners to use data to direct our limited resources to stop the shootings and killings.
WHY CEASEFIRE WAS NEEDED IN COLUMBUS IN 2010 IN ZIPCODES 43205 and 43206
Like many other large U.S. cities, specific geographic areas in Columbus have been negatively affected by disproportionately high rates of gun violence. We examined the geographic patterns using police violent crime incident data for an 11-year period, from 2000-2010. Our analysis shows that precincts 5, 9, 11, and 12 consistently have the highest numbers of gun assaults, gun homicides, and gun robberies. The rate of violent gun crime varies across Columbus with the highest concentrations on the near east side in police Precincts 5, 6, 11, and 12 (in Zone 5 before redistricting). Precinct 12 consistently has the highest rates in the city with Precinct 11 ranking 3rd worst. A majority of homicide victims killed in Precincts 11 or 12 were below the age of 26 at the time of their death (14/24 or 58% -data from 1/2010-5/6/2011).
Laying the groundwork 2011-2013:
Ministries4Movement is a partnership of Family Missionary Baptist Church, Men for the Movement, OSU research team, CeaseFire Columbus, National Center for Urban Solutions, with members of the community. We have developed a holistic approach to curbing gun violence and changing the conditions/quality of life in the community. We are actively engaged in efforts to mobilize the community within the boundaries of 22nd Street, Lockbourne, Whittier, and Livingston Avenue.
The 1st Sunday monthly healing march and service has transformed into a Movement addressing life issues and help our neighborhood transform back into the vibrant community village to ensure the next generation thrives. July 2013 marked our 45th consecutive march. With a small grant from Ohio Attorney General Mike DeWine’s office in 2011, Ministries 4 Movement was able to implement street outreach, violence interruption, community mobilization, and an effective public awareness campaign. Unfortunately, we were unable to sustain the program once the $50,000 of funding from the Attorney General was gone. We reached the goals we had made for ourselves. Shooting and Killings were down in our area for 27-months in a row from 2011-2013.
Ministries 4 Movement continues to “Bringing our people into the awareness of their total being of being body, soul and spirit, in the efforts of a combined community commitment of restoring structure, stability, support and security to every residence.”
Initially Posted 12-3-09; Updated 6-19-10, Updated 12-5-11