Oakland has a long history of envisioning and investing in public safety programs outside of policing. Since the 1990s, Oakland organizations have piloted programs that treat root causes instead of just symptoms. In doing so, these programs taught us that the problems our communities are facing need specialized responses. Youth ALIVE! showed that violence is often a public health crisis best met by people who've survived it themselves, launching the nation's first hospital-based violence intervention program at Highland Hospital in 1994. Similarly, since 2008, unarmed community ambassadors in Oakland have shown us that a watchful, familiar presence can hold a block together.

These programs work because they're built for specific problems and don’t operate as a one-size-fits-all approach. Mental health crises, youth violence, neighborhood safety are issues that call for their own kind of expertise. Oakland has been building out public safety programming for  thirty years and we hope to continue building solutions in that legacy.