Gang Intervention/Prevention

Target Population
Young people who are involved or at-risk of becoming involved in street gangs. Typically, these youth are male and females ages10-18. These youth are also from urban, suburban and rural communities and often pose significant challenges to schools, law enforcement and human service agencies.

Program Goals

• Maintain youth safely in a community setting without jeopardizing public safety;
  • Ensure youth are engaged and performing well in an educational/vocational program and/or assist the youth with gainful employment through a Supported Work Program;
  • Reduce the incidence of gang-related violence and victimization;
  • Address the systemic issues that often lead youth to join street gangs: peers, family structure, employability and other risk factors; and
  • Enhance public safety by employing neighborhood-based Advocates, "street workers" that reflect the ethnic diversity of the community, to divert youth from street gang culture.

Strategies for Intervention

• Assessing the youth's level of gang involvement and associated risk factors;
  • Gang Extrication through aggressive community linkage, outreach services, and if necessary, relocation;
  • Disrupting the level of gang involvement and decreasing risk to themselves and to the community;
  • Assisting youth in identifying positive alternatives to gang lifestyle;
  • Substance Abuse Prevention and Intervention;
  • Build Family Resources and Functioning in the Community; and
  • Crisis intervention and safety planning.

Service Delivery Process
The YAP approach to street gangs is based on an individualized approach in working both with youth at-risk of street gang involvement and gang-involved youth. The program works to organize a team of people who can support youth to maintain a gang-free lifestyle. For youth who are currently gang-involved, YAP uses the wraparound process to coordinate formal and informal services and supports that will help a youth to develop positive alternatives to a gang lifestyle. Critical to the success of the program is the development of a caring and "trust" relationship between a positive adult role model, referred to as an Advocate, and a young person and his/her family. Advocates are recruited from neighborhoods where the youth reside and are familiar with community resources and challenges. Advocates meet with their youth and families for a determined number of hours and contacts each week in their home, school, and community. Some modalities used in this endeavor include:

• Assess the youth and his/her family to develop an Individualized Service Plan (ISP) to address the individual needs of each youth;
  • Partnering with local law enforcement agencies, schools, Court, Probation, Parole and other stakeholders to develop a community-wide (Community Team) prevention and intervention program for high-risk youth;
    • Developing Retreats and Mediation for warring gangs. Examples include mediation between Blood and Crip Gang Members that occurred in Fort Worth, Texas in the mid 1990's. The retreats led to a decrease in gang-related violence in Southeast Fort Worth;
    • Assembling a Child-Family Team of adults from formal and informal community associations based on the needs, strengths and interests of the youth and family. These supports help to ensure community safety and the arrest-free return to court of each and also provide a forum for youth to both receive from and contribute to the local community;
  • Brokering and Advocating for each youth and family; Modeling for and Empowering families to broker and advocate for themselves; and
  • Providing 24/7 Crisis Intervention, Safety Planning, In-Home Family Support, Tutoring, Life Skill and Job Training Activities, and Job Preparation Programs (including Supported Work Initiative).

How to reach us
To contact YAP about our Gang Prevention/Intervention Services, please e-mail givory@yapinc.org or dnewman@yapinc.org.