II. The Community Alliance for Safety and Peace (CASP)

A. Changes since 2013

Since 2013, CASP has continued to evolve through the growth of its membership, tracking of data, strategic partnerships and leadership. We have continued to educate our Alliance on the importance of a public health approach to violence prevention. This is a prevention first approach that has evolved from our early roots in the PIER Model, which brings a continued commitment to intervention, enforcement and re-entry. This broad strategy to violence reduction continues to show promising results across our city and county over time, attracting a cross sector group of influential leaders who inform important policy decisions in many key systemic institutions such as education, faith-based organizations, community based organizations, philanthropy and local government.

One of the most striking changes has been in the membership of CASP which has become increasingly younger and more diverse in race. At our founding in 2008, the essential nature of having youth at the center of our decision making; however, at the time we had no young people participating in CASP. It has been our goal to involve more youth in CASP by making persistent invitations to young professionals to join the Alliance, inviting all members to bring program interns to CASP meetings, making youth focus groups a center piece of our strategic plan development and holding youth panels often as part of CASP meetings. Over time CASP has attracted numerous college age youth from Hartnell College, California State University Monterey Bay and the Middlebury Institute of International Studies (MIIS). The coalition’s partnership with MIIS students and instructors has been particularly fruitful as a result of their contributions to evaluation and the community, as young professionals in local agencies. We will continue to work to maintain representation from youth.

B. Strengths and Weaknesses

In 2017, the CASP Strategic Work Plan Committee conducted a SWOT analysis with the General Assembly. Members identified the coalition’s greatest strength as its diversity. What had begun in 2009 as an exclusive group of officials and department heads, has grown to more closely resemble the population of Salinas: Younger and Latino. The SWOT analysis revealed the coalition’s weakness to be funding. While Silicon Valley cities fund local programs through an RFP process to fulfill their strategic plan objectives, Salinas adopted a collective impact approach, inviting agencies to align their work with the City’s strategic plan objectives. Each agency sought their own funding, primarily through local and federal grants. A more centralized approach funded through a municipal bond or larger federal grant was rejected by the members of the Strategic Work Plan, as bypassing local agencies and leaders.

C. Coalition Structure

One important structure of CASP that has remained unchanged is the continued Co-Chair roles, designated for the Mayor of Salinas and one County Supervisor. Recently our second Mayor to ever Co-chair CASP passed away unexpectedly, and the newly elected Mayor stepped into the role without hesitation. In 2016, we had our first change in Supervisor, when Supervisor Luis Alejo graciously stepped into this role, embracing the Alliance and its members. These Co-Chairs oversee meetings of the General Assembly and the Board of Directors. CASP is staffed by the City of Salinas, Community Safety Administrator, who serves as the Director of CASP.