Richmond housing authority outlines summer safety plan for public-housing hot spots

Steven Nesmith, chief executive officer of the Richmond Redevelopment and Housing Authority (RHA), told the Public Safety Standing Committee that RHA will roll out a multi-pronged safety strategy in its six high-need public-housing sites, including summer youth employment, de-escalation training, a tip line and targeted lease enforcement.

RHA is pursuing those steps, Nesmith said, because "year to date, we are 3 more homicides than we were at this time last year," a statistic he said gives the agency a "sense of urgency." He told the committee the plan pairs expanded resident services and youth programming with enforcement against people who use public-housing units to sell or store guns and drugs.

Nesmith said the strategy focuses on three lines of work: prevention (youth employment and safe spaces), resident engagement (anonymous tip line and community outreach) and enforcement (use of RHA lease remedies). "Idle minds and idle time is a devil's workshop," he said, and RHA will try to reduce idle time by funding jobs and safe recreational spaces.

RHA said it has secured 50 summer employment slots…