Overview
- City Hall and the Mayor’s Office of Neighborhood Safety and Engagement are circulating a draft five‑year Comprehensive Violence Prevention Plan built around six pillars and are holding public listening sessions to collect resident input.
- The draft adds new program areas including conflict de‑escalation and mediation training, initiatives to promote safe firearm storage, and a city youth diversion program intended to steer young people away from the juvenile system.
- Many meeting attendees urged the city to invest earlier in children through libraries, rec centers and other youth programs so interventions reach kids long before teen years.
- Mayor Brandon Scott and MONSE cited recent year‑over‑year drops in homicides and nonfatal shootings and credited community groups such as Safe Streets and We Are Us plus increased city investment for part of the improvement.
- Residents raised concerns about concentrations of transition homes, reentry services and drug programs in some Black residential neighborhoods and the Baltimore Police acknowledged parts of the draft could be improved; officials plan to finalize the plan by fall.