BJA FY 23 Reimagining Justice: Testing a New Model of Community Safety

OJP is committed to advancing work that promotes civil rights and racial equity, increases access to justice, supports crime victims and individuals impacted by the justice system, strengthens community safety and protects the public from crime and evolving threats, and builds trust between law enforcement and the community. With this solicitation, BJA seeks to fill a gap within OJP’s current funding plan by seeding the development, implementation, and testing of new or innovative approaches to achieving community safety that are alternatives to a traditional enforcement model for communities experiencing a precipitous increase in less serious and lower-level crimes. This solicitation will fund applications proposing an innovative strategy or model to improve community safety, build trust, limit unnecessary involvement in the criminal justice system, and improve residents’ perceptions of law enforcement and procedural fairness and legitimacy. BJA’s Reimagining Justice: Testing a New Model of Community Safety Program will invest in a collaborative network of community-based organizations and institutions as well as local non-law enforcement government agencies. This collaboration will address these increases in less serious/lower-level crimes through the delivery of coordinated programs and services in order to avoid any unnecessary criminal justice system involvement. This new community safety model will support the development of community-led responses to the needs and objectives of community leaders, residents, and other stakeholders through a community engagement process. This approach can include coordination with law enforcement entities, where appropriate, in order to focus on a locality or one or more neighborhoods experiencing a precipitous increase in less serious crime.