CINCINNATI (CINCINNATI ENQUIRER) -Cincinnati City Council is poised to put $275,000 toward a gun violence reduction program that attempts to pull “active firearms offenders” away from street life with pay, travel, job training, therapy, and more, according to our media partners at the Cincinnati Enquirer.

The money for the program is part of a $65 million spending plan for money that was not spent as part of last year’s budget. Council is scheduled to vote on the last portion of the spending bill Wednesday.

The anti-violence program was put into the spending bill during a Budget and Finance Committee meeting Monday, but few details were announced.

“You all understand how rough it has been these last few weeks,” said Vice Mayor Jan-Michele Lemon Kearney, who is championing launching the program in Cincinnati. “We just lost a 5-year-old, a victim of a drive-by shooting. He was asleep in his bed in Winton Hills. We know that not that long ago my staff member’s family was affected when their nephew was shot four to six times in the back. He was 18 years old… we have to do something about it.”

One city’s success

Advance Peace was first presented to the city council last Spring as a way to deal with gun violence. The program’s founder in Richmond, California, DaVone Boggansaid that between 2010 and 2014 his city had a 54% reduction in fatal shootings and a 50% reduction in nonfatal shootings.

Richmond, California is a city about a third the size of Cincinnati. It received $600,000 in its first year in 2010 and was receiving $1 million by its third year.

Cincinnati’s $275,000 contribution is a fraction of that, but it comes with the caveat that outside money would be raised. But nobody could say how much.

It’s also unclear how many people the Cincinnati program could afford to help. It would be overseen by Cincinnati Works, a local non-profit whose work focuses on giving people a second chance.

The US Department of Justice is intrigued by the program, which operates in 11 cities.

Last fall the The Justice Department gave Advance Peace $2 million to partner with UC Berkeley to evaluate data from participating cities to determine how successful the model is.

Lansing, Michigan has seen a 65% reduction in gun violence since adopting Advance Peace in 2022. The Trace, a non-profit newsroom dedicated to gun violence, reported that nationally cities saw a 12.3% drop in homicides from 2022 to 2023.

Kearney brought the idea forward and has traveled to other cities to see how the program works. She declined to comment, but publicly said the program has been successful elsewhere.

Scotty Johnson, the chair of the city’s public safety and governance committee, said the program will give different groups and advocates throughout the city a chance to collaborate together.

Advance Peace offers firearms offenders direct pay for reaching life goals as part of the fellowship in the program, and operates separately from law enforcement. Participants can remain anonymous.

Boggan said this anonymity provides safety for people who have violent enemies and also builds trust with the participants making them more likely to choose a fellowship over their current street life.

How Advance Peace works

Like other programs the city has offered in the past, Advance Peace offers wraparound services to the people involved: therapy, connections to social services, job training and mentoring. Boggan said the fellows have at least seven contacts with staff daily during the 18-month fellowship.

But it differs by offering cash payments to fellows for meeting life goals they’ve defined in the program.

Another key point of the program is “transformative travel,” Boggan said. He said trips out of the city give the fellows a chance to get away from the danger they face and understand there is life outside of their neighborhood and city.

Advance Peace also differs from other programs in its independence. Boggan said his workers are able to attract potential criminals to their program because they separate themselves from law enforcement.

Past programs have relied on “call-ins” to give offenders an ultimatum: Get help or you’ll be the target of law enforcement. There is no such ultimatum with Advance Peace.

Boggan said that the cost per fellow per year is, at a minimum, $37,000.

What police say

Cincinnati police union president Ken Kober is skeptical.

“Just because it works in Richmond, doesn’t mean it will work here, but maybe it would,” Kober said.

He was critical of the program’s lack of cooperation with law enforcement. He said the department has spent years building trust with the community, and this could be a step backwards.

“Instead of paying folks to stay out of trouble, why don’t we focus on job placement?” Kober said, adding that paid vocational training, trade apprenticeships and other education could be helpful too.

Councilwoman Anna Albi, who campaigned on anti-violence initiatives, said Advance Peace is just one part of a bigger solution that the city is investing in.

Among other programs, she pointed to a new hospital-based violence intervention program.

“It’s very important to me that our residents understand the holistic approach the city is taking around gun violence prevention,” Albi said. “You’ve heard me say more than once that it’s a ‘yes’ approach − it’s not just one thing, but the culmination of multiple, data-driven approaches. I see Advance Peace as one more tool in the toolbox when it comes to violence reduction.”

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