Community

Engagement

Strength

Power

Sponsored by Together We Rise Coalition

Advocacy for declaring gun violence as a public health crisis; provides holistic strategy for addressing the crisis of crime.

Project Ripple is a holistic strategy that addresses the various aspects that impact public safety through three levels of engagement – nano, micro, and macro. The foundation of Project Ripple is community and neighborhood engagement, collaboration, and unity. Project Ripple is designed as a resident-engagement plan to ensure sustainable and generational community engagement. Moreover, it is based on the needs that represent survivors and victims of violence, their family members, and residents.

CRISIS

More than 200 lives are taken by gun violence each year. Gun violence can dismantle the sense of safety and influence how people navigate their environments. It leaves survivors with a “new normal” of coping. The emotional damage and effects on mental health can be long-term.

“The environment in which we grow up, live, work, and grow old can have a major influence on our individual actions, and research increasingly shows this has implications for reducing gun violence” (https://everytownsupportfund.org/how-everytowns-community-safety-fund-grantees-prevent-gun-violence/). Project Ripple is a community and neighborhood engagement, collaboration, and unity, and it is a resident-engagement plan to ensure sustainable and generational community engagement.

Project Ripple SOLUTION

Declare Gun Violence as a Public Health Crisis.
Name a City Commission to address Gun Violence in the City of Cleveland.
This commission would be composed of representatives from various sectors of Cleveland and the state of Ohio.
Establish Community Clubhouses (resources and activities) within neighborhoods in high gun violence areas, which will be led by neighborhood elected leaders.
Provide wraparound Mental Health Services to survivors of violence.

The People’s Office

The People’s Office is a product of Project Ripple’s micro-level strategy. The People’s Office operationalizes community power by creating a resident-led civic space where lived experience drives action, accountability, and governance.