Violence Reduction & Prevention

Building Resilience Against Youth Violence and Exploitation (BRAYVE) (Formerly Youth and Young Adult Violence Reduction)

In 2024, the City took a comprehensive approach to youth violence reduction and broadened the focus of violence reduction to include prevention measures in addition to intervention services. This approach emphasizes the value of prevention, such as youth development opportunities and access to educational supports like mentoring, along with intervention strategies, as an effective strategy in reducing youth violence.

Neighborhood and Community Services does this by contracting with community based organizations to offer valuable youth development and educational resources, mental health supports, and intervention services throughout community.

Background:

Since 2013, the City of Tacoma has implemented the Office of Juvenile Justice & Delinquency Prevention’s (OJJDP) Comprehensive Gang Model. This evidenced-based framework is a set of five core strategies that guide the coordination and community collaboration to reduce youth violence.

The City continues to strategize on ways to enhance this approach to addressing youth and young adult violence and other crime prevention services that incorporate community feedback and the needs of our community.

Comprehensive Gang Model (five core strategies)

• Community Mobilization - community engagement and collaboration
• Opportunities Provision - education, training, and employment programs
• Social Intervention - outreach and access to provision of services for gang-involved youth and their families
• Suppression - community policing with formal and informal social controls and accountability measures
• Organizational Change and Development - development of policy for effective use of resources

The City recognizes the importance of providing comprehensive prevention and intervention programs to address violent crime and commercial sexual exploitation of children (human trafficking).

To some, human trafficking can be seen as a high-profit, low-risk venture when there is an absence of other economic opportunities, despite the risks of violence and serious criminal involvement. This same lack of opportunity can often lead youth and young adults to engage in violent crimes.

We are committed to investing in services that increase safety and supports systems, while decreasing violence in our community. We invest in programming that is trauma-informed, culturally relevant, evidence-based, and is centered in diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI).

Read the Youth and Young Adult Violence Assessment of 2022 

By funding multiple providers for Youth and Young Adult Violence Reduction, we create greater sustainability of culturally relevant programs in the highest need communities. Programs and services support youth at-risk of committing violent crimes, human trafficking, and youth development programming.

Governance

This work is led by an Executive Steering Committee made up of local and state jurisdiction leaders, and community advocates.

Each year, the Mayor selects a Council Member to Chair and Vice Chair the committee. The Executive Steering Committee consists of key policy-level members of the community interested in youth violence prevention, intervention, suppression, and systems change to help inform and guide the direction the City will take at reducing youth violence

 How To Get Involved

The City’s Community Advisory Committee (CAC) and the Multidisciplinary Intervention Team (MDiT) are two ways the City engages stakeholders. Multiple sectors of the community (local government, law enforcement, juvenile justice, CBOs, lived-experience community members) collaborate to give input to the design and implementation of youth violence reduction strategies and help address needs and gaps in services.

• Community Advisory Board (CAC) – The purpose of this group is to strategize ways to enhance the partnership between identified neighborhoods (Hilltop, East Side, West of Tacoma Mall, Hosmer), service providers, and law enforcement, identify gaps in service, discuss areas of improvement, hear program implementation updates, and assess the structural issues that cause the problems with addressing youth and young adult violence and human trafficking.
  Meeting occurs quarterly. More information coming soon.

• Multiple Disciplinary Intervention Team (MDIT) – Monthly meeting held to share and collaborate among agencies serving youth and young adults who are gang/group-involved, or at risk of becoming gang/group-involved. The team-based approach helps ensure that all agencies working with these clients have a common goal and shared strategies for each client, as well as leverage resources and discuss other meaningful information to reduce violence and human trafficking within the community.

Meeting occurs the third Thursday of the month at 1 p.m.
Join Zoom Meeting
Meeting ID: 844 1776 2494
Passcode: 232866

Community Violence Prevention and Reduction 

The City of Tacoma provides funding to pilot the Community Trauma Response Team (CTRT) operated by JCW & Associates. CTRT was developed as a pilot following community discussions on the need for a liaison between community and police during traumatic events. The Community Police Advisory Committee carried the discussion forward and through collaboration and a commitment from all interested parties, the Community Trauma Response Team was activated in February 2022.

The Community Trauma Response Team (CTRT) is a volunteer-based program that provides trauma-informed post-crisis services in Tacoma after a traumatic incident. CTRT, comprised of culturally relevant volunteers and staff support, will respond to a wide range of events offering social and emotional supports to impacted community members who are involved in violence (such as: homicides, gun violence, violent crimes, and other community violent incidents).

Responses will support victims of violence or other people impacted by violence. CTRT will act independently from Tacoma’s Emergency Responders developing and maintaining good working relationships, not interfering in active investigations.

Services provided by CTRT: 

• 24-hour trauma response, social and emotional support 365 days a year.
• Quick response times. Volunteers of staff will respond within 30-60 minutes of notification.
• Respond to the scene of a traumatic incident or follow up with individuals after an incident occurred.
• Support and referrals designed to offer immediate, compassionate, and practical resources.

Community can request the presence or support of CTRT by calling the City of Tacoma Non-Emergency Line at (253) 591-5737.

Domestic Violence Resources and Support

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 1 in 4 women and 1 in 7 men have been victims of severe physical violence by an intimate partner, and nearly half of all men and women have experienced psychological aggression from a partner.

Understanding what domestic violence is and recognizing the signs are the first steps to escaping the cycle of violence. Domestic violence is a pattern of abusive behavior in an intimate relationship where one person tries to control or dominate the other. Assaulting, threatening or stalking an intimate partner (past or present) is a crime in the State of Washington (RCW 10.99.020).

In the 2025-2026 biennium, the City funded more than $1.5 million for services including:

• Advocacy and intervention services
• Case management and safety planning
• Counseling/Behavioral health services
• Criminal Justice services
• Financial services
• Education and training
• Street outreach
• Support groups

Learn more about how our work to improve family violence supportive services in the Strategic Alliance Recommendations Report 2021.