The City of Portland’s Office of Violence Prevention (OVP) grounds its work in understanding violence as a public health issue. It is proud to be a member of the National Institute of Criminal Justice Reform (NICJR) OVP Directors Network. The non-profit NICJR organization is working to transform the juvenile and criminal justice systems, and partners with the Cities United program. Cities United supports a national network of mayors who are committed to reducing the epidemic of homicides and shootings among young Black men and boys between the ages of 14 to 24 by 50 percent.
Together, the two programs implement four proven violence reduction strategies that are focused on eliminating violence in American cities related to African American men and boys. Portland's OVP utilizes the violence as a public health crisis model. We provide services and implement programs that are addressed in the four-strategy program.
Members of our OVP office also recently attended the Cities United and Health Alliance for Violence Intervention conferences.
We also want to thank members of Moms Demand Action for their kind and generous efforts to collect and donate care packages for victims of violence. We are grateful for their ongoing collaboration with our office.