What Calls Does This Handle?

CVI does not handle calls. The distinction matters — mobile crisis teams respond when someone dials 911. CVI workers are already in the community before any incident occurs. What follows is how programs across documented cities describe the populations they serve, the violence dynamics they address, and what falls outside their scope.

The Primary Population: Highest-Risk Individuals

Every documented CVI program begins with a targeting question and converges on a consistent answer.

Orlando’s Advance Peace focuses on what program worker Raysean Brown described to WESH as “the guys that are committing the gun violence or most likely to be the victim.” Aurora’s SAVE program identifies what Division Chief Mark Hildebrand described as “specific social groups of kids in the highest risk.” In Chicago, CRED operates in fifteen neighborhoods that account for roughly half of the city’s gun violence, per the Chicago Tribune. The SC2 initiative reports that CRED currently reaches about 15% of the people assessed as highest-risk, with a goal of 75%.

Programs use multiple identification methods. Street intelligence — credible messengers who live in the targeted neighborhoods and know the people, networks, and conflicts firsthand — is the method practitioners describe as primary. Social media monitoring tracks disputes as they develop online. Hospital notifications flag shooting victims at risk of retaliation. Police data sharing provides incident information, though as the 2023 ProPublica investigation documented, accepting police data creates the risk that CVI is perceived as a police intelligence operation. Court and reentry referrals connect people leaving incarceration to CVI services. School referrals and self-referrals round out the identification funnel. Chicago, Baltimore, and Orlando layer several methods together.

Shooting Victims (Retaliation Prevention)

A Minneapolis analysis found that 41% of shooting victims were shot again within five years. Hospital-Based Violence Intervention Programs operate at this intervention point, deploying credible messengers to the bedside.

Grady Hospital in Atlanta reported a 98% acceptance rate among eligible patients in its first year (2023-2024), per 11Alive reporting. The population is primarily victims of penetrating trauma — gunshot and stabbing. Age ranges vary by program: Grady targets 14-24, per 11Alive; Johns Hopkins serves 15-35, per its published RCT; Cleveland focuses on youth ages 6 through 17, per UH Rainbow Hospitals (the Ideastream-reported 6-15 range reflects a specific research study population, not the program’s full service range).

Former police officer and criminal justice professor Thomas Stuckey described the HVIP results: a “two-thirds reduction in the likelihood that someone with a violent injury will need similar emergency medical assistance.” The Indianapolis Prescription for Hope program at Eskenazi Hospital found, in a 2018 long-term evaluation, a 3% repeat injury rate among participants compared to 8.7% without the program.

Youth in High-Violence Schools and Communities

School-based CVI programs place credible messengers on campus. In Albuquerque, the West Mesa High School program provides what the Albuquerque Journal described as “on campus peer-to-peer support” in partnership with Foot Locker, which provides retail employment pathways for program participants. The school’s principal told the Journal that “being reactive is not working. We cannot rely on a single solution.”

In Baltimore, Safe Streets expanded into schools with what the city described as “five intervention strategies” including “restorative practices to combat violent behavior.” In Pine Bluff, Arkansas, a youth-focused approach using what THV11 described as “custom in-person visits to individuals identified as high-risk” produced 543 consecutive days without a juvenile homicide before the streak ended in June 2025.

Families and Social Networks of Victims

The Oakland case documented by ProPublica illustrates the scope. Violence interrupter Joseph Truehill met the family of a murdered 15-year-old at the hospital, stayed “until 5 a.m.,” then “connected the mother to long-term support, checked on her daily for two weeks, ordered DoorDash meals, helped with funeral costs.” The mother testified: “If I didn’t [get support]… I might be in retaliation mode.”

Chicago’s READI model provides wraparound services including employment, housing, therapy, and legal aid that extend to the participant’s immediate environment. As the University of Chicago describes the READI design: “subsidized, supported work combined with group cognitive behavioral therapy” providing “a stable source of income to deter illegal work, an incentive to participate in therapy, a place to build and reinforce new skills and norms.”

Individuals Returning from Incarceration

Chicago’s READI accepts referrals from criminal justice sources alongside outreach-referred participants. The University of Chicago’s 2024 evaluation found that the outreach-referred subgroup showed a 79% reduction in shooting and homicide arrests, compared to 65% for the full cohort. As the researchers noted, the method of identification may affect outcomes.

Geographic Targeting

CVI programs operate in specific neighborhoods, not citywide. In Detroit, the Force Detroit program documented a 72% drop in homicides and shootings in targeted neighborhoods from November 2023 to January 2024 versus the prior year, per the City of Detroit and Detroit Free Press. The citywide decline during the same period was 37%. In Baltimore, the Penn North site went 478 consecutive days without a homicide, per the Baltimore Banner.

The geographic concentration means CVI is designed for the pattern that most high-violence cities exhibit: a small number of places producing a disproportionate share of shootings, as the Chicago Tribune documented with Chicago’s fifteen neighborhoods.

The Violence Dynamics CVI Addresses

CVI addresses retaliatory, network-driven, concentrated community violence — gang-related shootings, disputes escalating within small social networks, retaliatory cycles following an initial shooting, and interpersonal violence within high-risk communities.

The evidence base measures outcomes primarily in firearm metrics: shooting reductions, homicide declines, reinjury rates. But as the field describes, the work engages the broader violence ecosystem — conflict mediation addresses disputes that might escalate to violence of any kind. A community experiencing retaliatory cycles may be a candidate regardless of whether the violence involves firearms.

What CVI Does Not Handle

CVI is not designed for behavioral health crises — mobile crisis teams serve that population. CVI is not designed for domestic violence between intimate partners, which involves distinct dynamics of power, control, and coercion requiring specialized responses. CVI is not designed for random violent crime — a mugging by a stranger or a bar fight between people with no prior connection does not fit the network-driven contagion model.

CVI is not a general social service. While programs provide wraparound support, those services exist to stabilize people at the center of violence networks — tools in service of violence reduction, not standalone programs.

The Scale Question

The gap between need and capacity is the most consequential number in any CVI landscape. In Chicago, CRED serves approximately 15% of the people assessed as highest-risk, with a goal of reaching 75%, per the SC2 initiative. CVI programs operate in most of the largest U.S. cities, but within those cities, coverage is partial.

The University of Chicago’s Leadership Academy takes six months per cohort and has reached 21 cities, per the Chicago Defender. But the credible messenger credential — lived experience with violence — cannot be mass-produced. Rural and suburban communities face an additional gap: the CVI evidence base and program infrastructure is concentrated in high-violence urban areas. Whether the model adapts to non-urban contexts remains largely untested.

Bottom Line

CVI serves the small, identifiable population at the center of community violence networks — what Orlando’s program describes as “the guys that are committing the gun violence or most likely to be the victim.” Programs operate in specific high-violence neighborhoods, not citywide. The violence dynamics CVI addresses are retaliatory, network-driven, and concentrated. CVI does not handle behavioral health crises, domestic violence, random crime, or general social service needs. The primary constraint on who CVI reaches is capacity: Chicago’s CRED reaches roughly 15% of its identified target population, and that gap between need and coverage exists in every documented city.

Source Appendix

Orlando Advance Peace — targeting, Raysean Brown. WESH, 2023. Also: ClickOrlando/News 6, November 2023. https://www.clickorlando.com/getting-results/2023/11/08/shootings-are-down-by-37-in-orlando-city-credits-new-crime-prevention-program/
Aurora SAVE — Division Chief Hildebrand. 9NEWS, September 2023. https://www.9news.com/article/news/crime/aurora-program-reduce-youth-violence/73-49d6756d-113b-4653-98a2-e4ab972d3bfa
Chicago — 15 neighborhoods, 15% of highest-risk, goal 75%. Chicago Tribune, February 2024. https://www.chicagotribune.com/2024/02/01/foundations-business-interests-raise-66-million-to-fight-crime-in-chicago/ Also: SC2 initiative. https://www.scalecvichicago.org/
Minneapolis — 41% of victims reshot within five years. CBS Minnesota. Also: PBS Frontline, 2021. https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/frontline/article/groups-arise-spurred-by-minneapolis-gun-violence-to-enact-early-interventions/
Grady Hospital, Atlanta — 98% acceptance rate, age range 14-24. 11Alive Atlanta, January 2024. https://www.11alive.com/article/news/local/grady-hospital-atlanta-ivyy-program-tackling-gun-violence-one-year-progress/85-6546fc09-ea58-469f-a4e8-0725878c65d3
Thomas Stuckey — “two-thirds reduction.” Bell et al., Journal of Trauma, 2018. https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC5739956/ Also: Indianapolis Prescription for Hope evaluation. Also: Bell et al., PMC/Journal of Trauma, 2018. https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC5739956/
Indianapolis Prescription for Hope — 3% vs. 8.7%, 2018 evaluation. Bell et al., Journal of Trauma, 2018. https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC5739956/
Albuquerque West Mesa High School — principal quote, Foot Locker partnership. Albuquerque Journal, March 2024. https://www.abqjournal.com/news/giving-hope-to-high-risk-youths/article_c47eee78-b979-11ee-8a6d-2b9ad65a8bf3.html
Baltimore school expansion — “five intervention strategies.” Baltimore City Mayor’s Office, “Mayor Scott Announces School-Based Violence Intervention Pilot Programming,” October 25, 2022. https://mayor.baltimorecity.gov/news/press-releases/2022-10-25-mayor-scott-announces-school-based-violence-intervention-pilot Also: CBS Baltimore, October 2022. https://www.cbsnews.com/baltimore/news/three-baltimore-city-schools-implementing-violence-intervention-programs/
Pine Bluff — 543 days, streak ended June 2025. THV11, May 2025. https://www.thv11.com/article/news/local/pine-bluffs-gun-violence-intervention-program-500-days-no-juvenile-homicide/91-371d5b84-ded6-438d-b0b7-8a2df3cec869 Also: KARK, June 2025.
Oakland mother testimony — Joseph Truehill. ProPublica, Alec MacGillis, May 2023. https://www.propublica.org/article/are-community-violence-interruption-programs-effective
READI — program design, outreach-referred subgroup 79%, full cohort 65%. Heller et al., QJE, 2024. https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC10898100/
Detroit Force Detroit — 72% targeted, 37% citywide. City of Detroit press release. https://detroitmi.gov/ Also: Detroit Free Press.
Baltimore Penn North — 478 days. Baltimore Banner, March 2024. https://www.thebanner.com/community/criminal-justice/safe-streets-penn-north-JLZH6TGFJFAYHCIIMMTT4J4OD4/
CVI program descriptions — violence ecosystem description. Term used across HAVI, University of Chicago, and multiple program descriptions.
University of Chicago Leadership Academy — 21 cities, six months. Chicago Defender, September 2023. https://crimelab.uchicago.edu/
ProPublica investigation — identification tensions, police data risk. ProPublica, Alec MacGillis, May 2023. https://www.propublica.org/article/are-community-violence-interruption-programs-effective
Johns Hopkins HVIP — age range 15-35. Cheng et al., Pediatrics, 2008. Also: AAMC review. https://www.aamc.org/news/can-hospitals-help-reduce-violence
Cleveland HVIP — serves ages 6-17 (UH Rainbow Trauma Recovery Program). Ideastream Public Media, Stephen Langel, February 11, 2025 (references a 2017 research study with ages 6-15). https://www.ideastream.org/health/2025-02-11/university-hospitals-program-reduces-repeat-violence-among-young-gunshot-victims Also: UH Hospitals program page. https://www.uhhospitals.org/rainbow/about/trauma-recovery-program