Safety and Justice
Safe neighborhoods are critical to building sustainable communities. With this understanding, Greater Kansas City LISC’s focus on crime and safety helps to establish problem-solving partnerships among law enforcement, community developers, neighborhood leaders, residents, business owners and members of other neighborhood institutions. Yet real partnerships that go beyond basic information-sharing to spur strategic collective action and build collective efficacy are often hard earned, particularly in light of resource constraints and historic distrust between communities - especially communities of color - and police.
LISC’s crime and safety efforts span a broad range of projects, including support and active partnerships in:
- KC No Violence Alliance (KC NoVA)
- The Department of Justice Justice Byrne Criminal Justice Innovation (BCJI) grant (now known as "Innovations in Community Based Crime Reduction" or CBCR)
- The Community Resource Team (CRT) along Prospect Avenue.
Critical to success is LISC’s ability to engage a range of city and nonprofit agencies in crime reduction efforts, advocate for solutions that are supported by neighborhoods and residents, and identify solutions that build a neighborhood’s collective efficacy.
Through LISC’s support, community-based organizations catalyze physical change in high-crime environments to create lasting symbols of real community-police collaboration.
In safe and just neighborhoods residents feel empowered to achieve their full potential. We’ve compiled resource and tools to help practitioners lead safety and justice efforts that address the root causes of crime to help build more just, vibrant, and equitable communities.
Abandoned homes throughout the east side recently received an artistic makeover, thanks to a partnership between Greater Kansas City LISC, the City of Kansas City, Missouri and one of the world’s most well-known creative entities.
Graffiti doesn’t stand a chance in one Kansas City neighborhood as a community group puts in new efforts to paint over the work of vandals along the Prospect Corridor.
