Champaign Community Coalition December Meeting

The Champaign Community Coalition yesterday touched on a number of important issues this month, from the upcoming training to interrupt violence to the ability to get information to those who need it about programs in the area. From the News Gazette today:

Mental-health counselor to community coalition: Find gaps in resources
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At Wednesday's meeting, Karen Simms, a mental-health counselor and trauma expert who in the past called for a "network analysis" to "evaluate what we have in place and what is missing," built on her comment in June that "we don't have a clear picture of where our needs are" by calling for coalition members to brainstorm existing resources for all age groups to find out where gaps exist...

Simms specifically mentioned a gap in vocational training and mentoring of adults and teens, and others in the room talked about a lack of trust for once-trusted organizations and programs in part because of a difference in need between generations.

When one community member shouted out that many youth haven't heard of programs that could benefit them, Simms called on members to think of better messaging and marketing opportunities to get the word out and "promote peace."

...

In other business, 40 members of the community will be trained Friday and Saturday to become "violence interrupters" and "peace seekers" in an effort to stop shootings and ease tense relationships between law enforcement and the community, as well as to introduce street-level mediation and employ other nonviolent approaches to conflict resolution.

Attendees also heard from Dr. Malcolm Hill of the Carle Community Initiative, who emphasized the importance of early-childhood development. He introduced members of the HOME Consortium, who gave information on early-childhood programs with services from prenatal up to age 5.

Full article here. There was a recent article on the upcoming training tomorrow, this Friday and Saturday, to interrupt violence on WCIA this week (video at the link):

"Violence interrupters" to hold training session
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C-U Area Project will hold a "violence interrupters" training for anyone who wants to be a part of what they hope will be a solution to curbing the violence. It's part of a national anti-violence project. The Ceasefire Violence Interrupters model has been used in cities nationwide. The director, Tio Hardiman, will be there to head up the professional training.

It'll focus on de-escalation, mediation and conflict resolution tactics as well as restoring relationships.  There have been seven shooting homicides in Champaign this year. C-U Area Project wants to bring in twelve new outreach members and that's what this training is for.

Jobie Taylor says, "We have to get in front of the violence before it even occurs. We're trying to prevent deaths, prevent shootings. So if we hear information through Facebook or through word of mouth then that's when we send our outreach workers out and they try to deescalate situations or mediate situations." 

Full article here. Information to sign up is also at the link, though it sounded like the class may already have been full last I checked.