Public Safety Committee
June 11, 2024
AGENDA REPORT
TO: Jestin D. Johnson FROM: Holly Joshi
City Administrator Chief of Violence Prevention
SUBJECT: DVP Community Grants DATE: May 13, 2024
City Administrator Approval Date:
RECOMMENDATION
Staff Recommends That The City Council:
1. Amend An Existing Grant With Youth Alive For Violence Prevention And Intervention Services For The Period Of October 1, 2023, To June 30, 2025, To Add Two Hundred Thousand Dollars ($200,000) That Was Originally Awarded To Catholic Charities Of The Diocese Of Oakland, For A Total Amount Not To Exceed Three Million Eight Hundred Thirteen Thousand Seven Hundred Fifty Dollars ($3,813,750), With The Ability To Extend The Agreement For An Additional Three Months In An Amount Not To Exceed Five Hundred Sixty-Six Thousand Two Hundred Fifty Dollars ($566,250) Contingent On Available Funds; And
2. Award A Grant To Urban Peace Movement–Oakland For Community Healing Services For The Period Of July 1, 2024, To June 30, 2025, In A Total Amount Not To Exceed Three Hundred Fifty Thousand Dollars ($350,000) Using Funds Originally Awarded To Movement Strategy Center As Urban Peace Movement’s Fiscal Sponsor, With The Ability To Extend The Agreement For An Additional Three Months In An Amount Not To Exceed Eighty-Seven Thousand Five Hundred Dollars ($87,500) Contingent On Available Funds; And
3. Amend An Existing Grant With Communities United For Restorative Youth Justice For Violence Prevention And Intervention Services For The Period Of October 1, 2023, To June 30, 2025, To Add One Hundred Fifty Thousand Dollars ($150,000) That Was Originally Awarded To Community & Youth Outreach, Inc., For A Total Amount Not To Exceed Two Million Three Hundred Fifty-Five Thousand Dollars ($2,355,000), With The Ability To Extend The Agreement For An Additional Three Months In An Amount Not To Exceed Three Hundred Fifty-Two Thousand Five Hundred Dollars ($352,500) Contingent On Available Funds.
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
The proposed resolution authorizes the City Administrator to make the following modifications to grants approved by Resolution 89899 C.M.S. and awarded by the Department of Violence Prevention (DVP) to community-based organizations for violence prevention and intervention services from October 1, 2023, to June 30, 2025:
Jestin Johnson (May 28, 2024 18:48 PDT)
May 28, 2024
Jestin D. Johnson, City Administrator
Subject: DVP Community Grants
Date: May 13, 2024 Page 2
Public Safety Committee
June 11, 2024
1. Amend an existing grant with Youth Alive for violence prevention and intervention services to fund therapy services from July 1, 2024, to June 30, 2025, that Catholic Charities of the Diocese of Oakland can no longer perform.
2. Execute a grant directly with Urban Peace Movement-Oakland for community healing services from July 1, 2024, to June 30, 2025, since they now have 501(c)(3) status and no longer require a fiscal sponsor (Movement Strategy Center).
3. Amend an existing grant with Communities United for Restorative Youth Justice for violence prevention and intervention services to fund school-based violence interruption services from July 1, 2024, to June 30, 2025, that Community & Youth Outreach, Inc. can no longer perform.
BACKGROUND / LEGISLATIVE HISTORY
FY23-25 Grant Agreements. In September 2023, the City Council approved Resolution 89899 C.M.S. and authorized grants to 23 community-based organizations (CBOs) to deliver violence prevention and intervention services from October 1, 2023, to June 30, 2025, with the ability to extend grants through September 30, 2025, if funding is available in the 2025-2027 Biennial Budget. Grantees were selected through request for qualifications (RFQ) #267700,4 that was released in December 2021 and to which 70 agencies applied.
Table 1 provides an overview of grants awarded to CBOs through Resolution 89899 C.M.S. in the service categories of healing activities, therapy, and school-based violence interruption.
Grantees funded for healing activities are tasked with hosting vigils and other community gatherings in response to incidents of community violence. Urban Peace Movement, specifically, is also tasked with helping families of homicide victims pay for funeral expenses when victims of crime applications are denied. The one grantee selected to provide therapy services is expected to provide individual therapy sessions to family members of homicide victims to help them process and heal from their trauma. Lastly, grantees funded for school- based violence interruption services are tasked with staffing violence interrupters placed at high schools in the Oakland Unified School District to identify potential student conflicts, conduct safety assessments, support de-escalation, proactively mediate conflicts, intervene to prevent retaliation following conflicts, and refer youth to needed services.
Jestin D. Johnson, City Administrator
Subject: DVP Community Grants
Date: May 13, 2024 Page 3
Public Safety Committee
June 11, 2024
Table 1. Grants Awarded to CBOs Through Resolution 89899 C.M.S. for October 1, 2023, to June 30, 2025.
Service
category
Agency Estimated #
served
Amount
Healing
activities
Building Opportunities for Self-Sufficiency 441 $437,500 Catholic Charities of the Diocese of Oakland 350 $350,000 Movement Strategy Center (fiscal sponsor for
Urban Peace Movement)
700 $612,500
Restorative Justice for Oakland Youth 350 $350,000
Therapy Catholic Charities of the Diocese of Oakland 91 $350,000 School-
based
violence
interruption
Communities United for Restorative Youth
Justice
70 $262,500
Community & Youth Outreach 70 $350,000
Youth ALIVE! 96 $481,250
Total 2,168 $3,193,750
School Violence Intervention and Prevention (VIP) Program. With funding from the DVP, the School VIP Program was implemented in seven high schools in the Oakland Unified School District during the 2022-2023 School Year as a community-based response to violence impacting high school students. The program places a team of three individuals – one violence interrupter, one gender-based violence (GBV) specialist, and one youth life coach (school VIP team) – in four comprehensive high schools and three continuation high schools to support students impacted by violence at school or in the community. School VIP team members have the following responsibilities:
• Violence interrupter: Identify potential student conflicts, conduct safety assessments, support de-escalation, proactively mediate conflicts, intervene to prevent retaliation following conflicts, and refer youth to needed services.
• Life coach: Provide case management to students who have caused or been victims of violence; help students and their families reduce high-risk behaviors, improve functioning, increase motivation, and address unhealthy beliefs.
• GBV specialist: Deliver workshops for students to address dating violence, stalking, sexual harassment, sexual assault, and commercial sexual exploitation; provide service referrals and general support for impacted students.
Table 2 provides an overview of funding sources and school assignments for school-based violence interrupters funded by the DVP during the 2023-2024 School Year. Five of the program’s eight violence interrupters are funded by Measure Z and three are funded through a grant that the DVP received from the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention (OJJDP).
Jestin D. Johnson, City Administrator
Subject: DVP Community Grants
Date: May 13, 2024 Page 4
Public Safety Committee
June 11, 2024
Table 2. Funding and School Assignment of Violence Interrupters for the School VIP Program During the 2023-2024 School Year by Agency.
Agency VIs funded by
Measure Z
VIs funded by
OJJDP grant
Schools staffed by VIs (# of VIs)
Community & Youth
Outreach, Inc.
2 0 McClymonds High School (1)
Bunche Academy (1)
Communities United for
Restorative Youth
Justice
1 1 Fremont High School (1)
Rudsdale Continuation School (1)
Youth Alive 2 2 Castlemont High School (2)
Dewey Academy (1)
Oakland High School (1)
Notification of Service Changes. In early January 2024, Catholic Charities of the Diocese of Oakland (CC) notified the DVP that they were unable to deliver therapy services beyond January 31, 2024, due to staffing capacity challenges. On April 16, 2024, Community & Youth Outreach, Inc. (CYO) notified the DVP that the agency will dissolve on August 1, 2024, and will be unable to perform services thereafter. Lastly, on April 5, 2024, Urban Peace Movement (UPM) notified the DVP that they will no longer be fiscally sponsored by Movement Strategy Center effective June 29, 2024, and will process all grant agreements going forward through their own 501(c)(3) known as “Urban Peace Movement – Oakland.”
ANALYSIS AND POLICY ALTERNATIVES
This resolution authorizes the City Administrator to amend two existing grants for violence prevention and intervention services to transfer funding for services that can no longer be performed by the originally designated agencies from July 1, 2024, to June 30, 2025. The resolution also authorizes the City Administrator to transfer grant funding from a fiscal sponsor to the agency selected to perform the services since fiscal sponsorship is no longer required.
Table 3 provides an overview of proposed amounts to be reallocated and recipient agencies.
Explanations for the selection of new agencies are provided below.
Table 3. Overview of Proposed Funding Reallocations for DVP FY23-25 Community Grants.
Service category Amount Original agency New agency
Therapy services $200,000 Catholic Charities of the
Diocese of Oakland
Youth Alive
Healing services $350,000 Movement Strategy
Center
Urban Peace Movement
– Oakland
School-based violence
interruption services
$150,000 Community & Youth
Outreach, Inc.
Communities United for
Restorative Youth
Justice
Therapy services. The DVP has determined that therapy for family members of homicide victims is a priority service that should continue for the remainder of the grant period, regardless of CC’s inability to provide the services. When CC notified the DVP that they were unable to Jestin D. Johnson, City Administrator
Subject: DVP Community Grants
Date: May 13, 2024 Page 5
Public Safety Committee
June 11, 2024
deliver therapy services beyond January 31, 2024, Youth Alive approached the DVP and shared their capacity and desire to deliver therapy services to families of homicide victims in CC’s place. Although Youth Alive did not apply to RFQ #267700,4 for therapy services, Youth Alive currently delivers therapy services to individuals impacted by violence through other funding sources and has the ability to serve family members of homicide victims with additional funding from the City. Additionally, Youth Alive was funded through RFQ #267700,4 to deliver services in the areas of hospital response, financial support for families of homicide victims, emergency relocation, and violence interruption and thus already has direct access to family members of homicide victims to offer therapy services.
Healing services. Resolution 89899 C.M.S. awarded funding to UPM to deliver healing services using Movement Strategy Center as a fiscal sponsor. Since UPM will no longer require fiscal sponsorship services after June 29, 2024, the DVP will execute a new grant agreement directly with UPM from July 1, 2024, to June 30, 2025.
School-based violence interruption services. The DVP has determined that school-based violence interruption services are priority services that must continue during the 2024-2025 School Year regardless of CYO’s inability to deliver services. To avoid a lengthy RFQ process that would interrupt current services, the DVP has decided to reallocate funding for one violence interrupter to another agency selected through the DVP’s competitive RFQ process for school- based violence interruption services. CURYJ and Youth Alive have successfully provided school-based violence interruption services during the 2022-2023 School Year and continue to do so during the 2023-2024 School Year. Both agencies also staff life coaches for the School VIP Program in addition to violence interrupters, which supports strong coordination of services for students. The DVP first approached CURYJ about their interest in hiring a third violence interrupter for the 2023-2024 School Year in an effort to more equally allocate resources and workload between CURYJ and Youth Alive. CURYJ accepted the offer, and therefore, the DVP recommends awarding an additional $150,000 to CURYJ to assume one of two violence interrupters originally assigned to CYO during the 2024-2025 School Year. To compensate for the second violence interrupter, the DVP will reassign one of the two OJJDP-funded violence interrupters currently assigned to Castlemont High School to the remaining school site (McClymonds High School or Bunche Academy) so that each of the seven schools has one full- time violence interrupter.
Citywide priorities. The proposed funding reallocations for FY23-25 community grants support the citywide priority of holistic community safety by ensuring that Oakland residents who are impacted by violence have access to therapy, healing, and violence interruption services that reduce trauma and further violence.
FISCAL IMPACT
Approval of this resolution will authorize the City Administrator to relocate funding approved through Resolution 89899 C.M.S. to three agencies that are unable to perform services for the duration of the grant period. The reallocation of funds will involve amending two existing grant agreements and executing one new grant agreement for services rendered from July 1, 2024, to June 30, 2025. Table 4 provides funding sources for each reallocation. The proposed changes Jestin D. Johnson, City Administrator
Subject: DVP Community Grants
Date: May 13, 2024 Page 6
Public Safety Committee
June 11, 2024
in recipient agencies will not involve allocating funds beyond what was already approved through Resolution 89899 C.M.S.
Table 4. Funding Sources for Grant Reallocations for the Service Period of July 1, 2024, to June 30, 2025.
Service category Amount Project Fund Org Program
Therapy services $200,000 1007417 1010 70211 SC22
Healing services $350,000 1007417 1010 70211 SC22
School-based violence interruption
services
$150,000 1007442 2252 70211 PS37
If a new ballot measure is authorized by voters in November 2024 and additional funds are appropriated to the DVP for grant agreements in the 2025-2027 Biennial Budget, the proposed resolution authorizes the City Administrator to extend services through September 30, 2025.
As in previous years, staff recommends that any unexpended balances due to grantees not meeting their deliverables be placed in the Measure Z – Violence Prevention and Public Safety Act of 2014 Fund (2252), Oakland Unite Organization (70211), Measure Z Service Prior Year Reserve Project (1004313), and Measure Z Program (PS37) and/or General Purpose Fund (1010), Oakland Unite Organization (70211), Reimaging Public Safety Project (1006367), and Fostering Safe and Healthy Communities Program (SC22).
PUBLIC OUTREACH / INTEREST
DVP staff conducted an extensive public input and planning process to develop the DVP’s 2022- 24 Strategic Spending Plan, which directly informed the RFQ solicitation for violence prevention and intervention services funded from July 1, 2022, to June 30, 2025. The DVP hosted four virtual community town halls from mid-February to mid-April 2021 to solicit input from Oakland residents impacted by violence, stakeholders, and community-based providers. These town halls averaged 92 attendees per event. In addition, DVP conducted 11 focus groups and 41 interviews with stakeholders, including family members who have lost loved ones to violence, DVP service providers and participants (by service strategy), local and national public health and violence prevention experts, members of the Reimagining Public Safety Task Force, and representatives from public partner agencies such as the Alameda County Probation Department and OUSD.
DVP staff have heard directly from community-based organizations and school stakeholders about the need to fund therapy, healing, and school-based violence interruption services from July 1, 2024, to June 30, 2025, due to their positive impact on reducing violence and trauma experienced by Oakland’s most vulnerable residents.
COORDINATION
The City Attorney’s Office, Budget Bureau, and City Administrator’s Office were consulted during the preparation of this agenda report and resolution. If the proposed funding recommendations are approved, the DVP will work closely with funded agencies to develop or Jestin D. Johnson, City Administrator
Subject: DVP Community Grants
Date: May 13, 2024 Page 7
Public Safety Committee
June 11, 2024
modify scopes of work, budgets, and deliverables for the service period of July 1, 2024, to June 30, 2025. Once grant agreements are finalized, the DVP will work closely with funded agencies to monitor service delivery, troubleshoot issues that arise, and support agencies in delivering services with the expected quality, dose, and reach for the duration of the award period.
PAST PERFORMANCE, EVALUATION, AND FOLLOW-UP
Performance Monitoring. During contract negotiations, the DVP establishes metrics for pre- identified deliverables that grantees are expected to meet during the grant award period (number of participants served, number of groups held, etc.). At least monthly, grantees must enter data on services rendered into the DVP’s data management system. For individual-level services, grantees must enter information for each individual served rather than summary data for all individuals. Apricot 360 then automatically tabulates grantee progress towards each deliverable based on the data entered. DVP program officers and planners review this data on a weekly basis. If grantees are falling behind in meeting deliverables before the completion of a contract year, program officers work with grantee staff to identify and troubleshoot the cause of the shortfall to improve performance.
From July 1, 2022, to September 30, 2023, CC delivered 1,480 therapy service hours to 58 individuals. During the same time period, Urban Peace Movement hosted 60 community events and provided funding to 43 family members of homicide victims.
Table 5 provides an overview of deliverables for school-based violence interruption providers from July 1, 2023, to December 31, 2023, which represents the first half of the 2023-2024 School Year.
Table 5. Deliverables for School-Based Violence Interruption Service Providers from July 1, 2023, to December 31, 2023.
Deliverable CYO CURYJ Youth Alive
Number of VIs 2 1 2
Number of conflict mediation
conversations held
43 62 38
Number of meetings with school
administrators
25 24 43
Impact Evaluation. Measure Z requires the regular evaluation of funded services by an external evaluator. In 2022, the City Administrator’s Office selected Urban Institute to evaluate DVP services funded by Measure Z from July 1, 2022, to December 31, 2024. The first Urban Institute evaluation report will be available in August 2024, and the final report will be produced by September 2025.
Jestin D. Johnson, City Administrator
Subject: DVP Community Grants
Date: May 13, 2024 Page 8
Public Safety Committee
June 11, 2024
SUSTAINABLE OPPORTUNITIES
Economic: There are no economic opportunities associated with this report.
Environmental: There are no environmental benefits associated with this report.
Race and Equity: All DVP-funded services are intended for Oakland’s most vulnerable residents who are impacted by group violence, intimate partner violence, or commercial sexual exploitation.
Of those served by DVP-funded services in 2023, 62% identified as African American, 24% identified as Latino, and 4% identified as multiracial. Continuing to fully fund services in the areas of therapy, community healing, and school-based violence intervention will reduce trauma and violence impacting these priority populations.
ACTION REQUESTED OF THE CITY COUNCIL
Staff Recommends That The City Council:
1. Amend An Existing Grant With Youth Alive For Violence Prevention And Intervention Services For The Period Of October 1, 2023, To June 30, 2025, To Add Two Hundred Thousand Dollars ($200,000) That Was Originally Awarded To Catholic Charities Of The Diocese Of Oakland, For A Total Amount Not To Exceed Three Million Eight Hundred Thirteen Thousand Seven Hundred Fifty Dollars ($3,813,750), With The Ability To Extend The Agreement For An Additional Three Months In An Amount Not To Exceed Five Hundred Sixty-Six Thousand Two Hundred Fifty Dollars ($566,250) Contingent On Available Funds; And
2. Award A Grant To Urban Peace Movement–Oakland For Community Healing Services For The Period Of July 1, 2024, To June 30, 2025, In A Total Amount Not To Exceed Three Hundred Fifty Thousand Dollars ($350,000) Using Funds Originally Awarded To Movement Strategy Center As Urban Peace Movement’s Fiscal Sponsor, With The Ability To Extend The Agreement For An Additional Three Months In An Amount Not To Exceed Eighty-Seven Thousand Five Hundred Dollars ($87,500) Contingent On Available Funds; And
3. Amend An Existing Grant With Communities United For Restorative Youth Justice For Violence Prevention And Intervention Services For The Period Of October 1, 2023, To June 30, 2025, To Add One Hundred Fifty Thousand Dollars ($150,000) That Was Originally Awarded To Community & Youth Outreach, Inc., For A Total Amount Not To Exceed Two Million Three Hundred Fifty-Five Thousand Dollars ($2,355,000), With The Ability To Extend The Agreement For An Additional Three Months In An Amount Not To Exceed Three Hundred Fifty-Two Thousand Five Hundred Dollars ($352,500) Contingent On Available Funds.
Jestin D. Johnson, City Administrator
Subject: DVP Community Grants
Date: May 13, 2024 Page 9
Public Safety Committee
June 11, 2024
For question s regarding this report, please contact Holly Joshi , Chief of Violence Prevention, at 510-920-6272.
Respectfully submitted,
Holly Joshi
Chief of Violence Prevention
Department of Violence Prevention
Reviewed by: Mailee Wang
Deputy Chief of Administration
Department of Violence Prevention
Prepared by: Jenny Linchey
Deputy Chief of Grants, Programs, and
Evaluation
Department of Violence Prevention
Holly Joshi (May 27, 2024 22:39 PDT)