Partner: Fort Valley Police Department
Focus areas: Training, Community Engagement
Fort Valley, a small city of 8,863 residents in central Georgia, has been challenged by increases in reported aggravated assaults and armed robbery. The Fort Valley Police Department, with a total authorized staff of 38, is the primary law enforcement agency for the city. The department was awarded RVCRI funding to address these challenges through community policing patrols within identified crime hot spots, increased training and educational opportunities for department personnel and strengthened collaborative problem-solving partnerships between the department and community members.
Fort Valley Police will dedicate personnel to each hot spot, charged with building deep relationships with residents, property owners and managers, and other community stakeholders. The department will also seek applicable training opportunities for personnel, likely in the areas such as investigative follow-up, victim services, and problem solving. Through these combined efforts, the city seeks to reduce violent crime activity within each of the identified project focus areas in Fort Valley.
RVCRI is an effort funded by the Bureau of Justice Assistance (BJA) to assist rural communities seeking to address violent crime.
The DOJ Bureau of Justice Assistance is supporting data-driven, comprehensive responses to crime in some of the country’s most troubled communities through BCJI.