Moving Beyond the Walls: Faith and Justice Partnerships Working for High-Risk Youth

摘要

Public/Private Ventures has launched a national demonstration in 15 cities to assess the effectiveness of faith-based institutions in working with youth involved in the juvenile justice system. The work of the Rev. Eugene Rivers and the Boston Ten Point Coalition inspired this national demonstration. The demonstration seemed to us important and timely given the large numbers of inner-city young people-especially African-American males-involved with the juvenile justice system; the scarce number of initiatives and programs that are effective in reducing these numbers; and the fact that in many poor urban communities faith-based institutions are the strongest, most rooted institutions remaining. In addition, it is clear from experience in numerous communities over the past two decades that community-building and community development initiatives are rarely successful without addressing issues of crime and violence. The idea of partnerships was, from the beginning, critical to the effectiveness of this effort. First, those faith-based organizations that do remain in poor urban neighborhoods are typically small, with few resources; and they have to work together to carry out the difficult job of working with high-risk youth. Second, strong partnerships between faith-based organizations and juvenile justice agencies are also critical-without those partnerships, it is unlikely that youth can be dealt with and served in a timely and effective manner. At the outset, it was not clear if these two essential partnerships-among faith-based organizations and between faith-based organizations and juvenile justice agencies-could be achieved. Perhaps Boston was an anomaly, dependent on unique leadership or a rare set of social conditions. This report documents the record to date in establishing these partnerships, their effectiveness and the challenges remaining.