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Champaign and Urbana expand city-funded violence-interruption program, post local street-outreach jobs
Summary
City and community partners described a city-funded Community Gun Violence Reduction Blueprint that officials say has coincided with a large drop in shootings; the plan includes five locally hired street-outreach positions trained by Aclavis and embedded funding in the city budget rather than a time-limited grant.
Champaign and Urbana officials and community partners described plans this month to expand a city-funded violence-interruption effort and hire local street-outreach workers as part of a multilayered strategy to prevent retaliatory and community gun violence.
Jorge Elvira, Community Relations Manager for the City of Champaign, said the Community Gun Violence Reduction Blueprint — rolled out in 2022 — has involved more than 30 partner organizations and has tied training, clinical services and rapid-response supports to police notifications of shootings. "Overall shootings, in 2021 ... were 259 incidents. Currently this year, we have 79 incidents," Elvira said, citing city data and describing what he called a substantial decrease in shootings and in the number of people struck by gunfire.
The blueprint will add five positions — three outreach workers, a case manager and a site supervisor — that the city and its partners say will be hired from the local community and receive weeklong, 40-hour initial training with booster sessions. "The initial training that they do is a full week, 40 hours," a representative from Aclavis, a public-health nonprofit that will provide training and implementation support, said. The organization described its model as community-led and focused on hiring staff from affected neighborhoods.
City officials emphasized that the program is embedded in the city budget. "This started through ARPA funds, but our city council has approved funding this through our budget," Jorge Elvira said. "This is not a grant. This is something that's funded by the city." Presenters said embedding the work into the municipal budget aims to sustain services beyond short-term grants.
Aclavis (spelled variously in the meeting transcript as Aclavus/Aclaviz/Aklavas) described its approach as public-health focused, offering skills development, peer mentorship and access to college education as part of workforce development for violence-prevention roles. The organization also said it has expanded nationally and has experience providing implementation support in multiple cities.
Questions and concerns raised by coalition members focused on the program’s local hiring and long-term supports for people who put down violence-involved activity. Tracy Parsons, the meeting facilitator, framed the need: "If I put it down, what's available for me? Where can I live? Where can I find a job?" speakers said, stressing the blueprint’s holistic aim to link employment, housing and services to outreach work.
Officials said the five positions are posted on Aclavis’s website and that hiring is intended to begin as soon as recruitment and training are complete. No formal vote or ordinance was taken at the meeting; presenters described program details, funding commitments and next steps for recruitment and local implementation.
