BJA FY 15 Byrne Criminal Justice Innovation Training and Technical Assistance Program

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The purpose of this FY 2015 competitive grant announcement is to select one provider to deliver a wide range of training and technical assistance (TTA) services to communities participating in the Byrne Criminal Justice Innovation (BCJI) Program. These services include, but are not limited to, helping neighborhoods build cross-sector partnerships; implement effective data-driven or innovative place-based revitalization strategies; engage local residents as equal and important stakeholders; build and increase trust between communities and the police; and collaborate with research partners to collect, analyze, and aid the sites in ongoing use of data to enhance program management and to sustain their strategies, and other matters relevant to the purposes of the BCJI Program. BCJI sites will leverage the TTA solicited through this competitive grant announcement to plan and implement data-driven, cross-sector strategies to reduce crime and violence. BCJI TTA activities will be coordinated with other federal interagency work and TTA activities, and a limited portion of TTA will be provided to jurisdictions with a Promise Zones designation to support public safety priorities. The results of the BCJI site efforts will be shared widely to assist other communities with improving and enhancing their crime reduction efforts. In times of limited resources, local and tribal leaders need tools and information about crime trends in their jurisdiction to assess, plan, and implement the most effective use of criminal justice resources to address these issues. They also need a core foundation of resources and tools to support data-driven strategy development, community-driven capacity building for collaborative problem solving, and assistance to identify and implement evidence-based and innovative strategies to target drivers of crime. A multi-faceted approach like BCJI targets crime in the locations where it is most occurring and can have the biggest impact while also building the capacity of the community to deter future crime by addressing three of the social impacts most likely to impact crime: physical disorder; social economic status and resources, and the “collective efficacy” of the neighborhood. BCJI is a central component of the Administration’s larger place-based programming efforts which includes the Promise Zones and Neighborhood Revitalization Initiative (NRI). These initiatives help local and tribal communities develop place-based, community-oriented strategies to change neighborhoods of distress into neighborhoods of opportunity. Through coordinated federal support, there are growing interagency efforts to align a comprehensive range of federal programs across several agencies, including Departments of Education (ED), DOJ, Health and Human Services (HHS), Housing and Urban Development (HUD), Agriculture (USDA), Interior, and Treasury to both build capacity and revitalize these communities.

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