National Network for Safe Communities

The National Network for Safe Communities, a project of John Jay College of Criminal Justice, was launched in 2009 under the direction of David Kennedy and Jeremy Travis, president of John Jay College. The National Network focuses on supporting cities implementing proven strategic interventions to reduce violence and improve public safety, minimize arrest and incarceration, enhance police legitimacy, and strengthen relationships between law enforcement and the communities it serves.

Scores of American cities have implemented the National Network’s strategies with powerful impact, particularly the Group Violence Intervention, first implemented as “Operation Ceasefire” in Boston in the mid-1990s, and the Drug Market Intervention, first implemented in High Point, North Carolina, in 2004.

Substantial research and field experience has proven that these interventions are associated with large reductions in violence and other serious crime. A Campbell Collaboration Systematic Review—the gold standard in assessing the body of evidence in social science interventions—found “strong empirical evidence” for the effectiveness of the strategies to address serious violent crime and overt drug markets. The National Network has also begun to adapt its strategic framework to other contexts, such as strategic prosecution, reconciliation between law enforcement and distressed communities, and problems such as domestic violence and prison violence.