Banner: Violence Prevention in partnership with the National Forum on Youth Violence Prevention

Other Youth Topics

Breadcrumb

  1. Youth Topics
  2. Violence Prevention
  3. Strategic Planning Toolkit for Communities
  4. Strategic Planning Toolkit: Step 1

Strategic Planning Toolkit: Step 1

Building Partnerships & Awareness

Youth violence problems are too complex for law enforcement or any single agency to resolve alone. Solutions require partnerships dedicated both to stopping youth violence before it starts and responding effectively when it does occur.

The strength of a plan may turn largely on the number and quality of the partnerships it includes. Strong plans include a diverse range of engaged stakeholders, including:

  • Law enforcement
  • Education
  • Social services
  • Public health
  • Labor
  • Community and faith-based organizations
  • Parents and youth
  • Business and philanthropic organizations.

Four Concept Areas

Strong plans also include robust strategies in the four concept areas of prevention, intervention, enforcement, and reentry, and importantly, the plans link strategies across these concepts.

This balanced approach requires a mix of organizations and individuals with expertise in the four concept areas. In Forum cities, efforts span from early childhood to young adulthood.

  • Prevention programming examples include youth development and family support services, educational and community mentoring, and in-school and out-of-school activities.
  • Intervention programs engage with high‐risk and gang‐involved youth in a range of settings, and may include educational, health, drug treatment, and other services.
  • Law enforcement efforts focus on the most serious, violent, and chronic youthful offenders and on crime hot spots.
  • Finally, reentry programs support youth offenders returning from confinement to the community and begin providing this support prior to their release.