YOUTH HAVEN PROJECT LAUNCHED

Building on a five year long collaboration to prevent youth gun violence,
The New Haven Family Alliance (NHFA) and the Yale School of Medicine Robert
Wood Johnson Foundation Clinical Scholars Program have been awarded funding
to engage New Haven youth in establishing YouthHaven, a youth led
collaboration of community stakeholders working to prevent and reduce youth
violence in New Haven. The Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of
Child Health and Development , member of the National Institutes of Health,
is providing funds over three years to support the YouthHaven project.



Gun violence in New Haven appears to be declining, but the history of
violence in New Haven continues to cause concern among youth and adults in
the city. Chronic exposure to violence can lead to "toxic stress" which
disrupts developing nervous, cardiovascular, immune and metabolic systems
and can impair learning, physical, behavioral and mental health. Solutions
to address violence often come from adult experts. YouthHaven is designed to
train a group of Youth Ambassadors from New Haven to engage youth across the
city in understanding the patterns and causes of violence in city
neighborhoods. Together, youth and adults committed to reducing violence at
the neighborhood level will take action to change institutional policies and
practices and strengthen neighborhoods to reduce violence. The research
developed by youth will be presented at a Youth Congress to be held at
Gateway Community College in late 2013 or early 2014. This Youth Congress
will be charged with developing action plans to sustain efforts to prevent
and reduce violence. These action plans and their implementation will be
monitored and evaluated during 2014 and 2015. We believe that the violence
reduction design and results of YouthHaven can serve as an example to
others.



Overseeing, guiding, and supporting the work of YouthHaven is a diverse
group of stakeholders that has been meeting for over a year to reduce
violence in our neighborhoods and help neighborhoods address the trauma that
pervasive community violence creates. This group known as the New Haven
Community Violence Response Group is attended monthly by over 30 individuals
including Chief of Police Esserman, representatives of the City Health
Department, Youth Services Department, community-based and
neighborhood-based organizations, federal agencies, health care providers,
the faith community, Gateway Community College and others interested
reducing youth violence.



The New Haven Violence Response Group will assist YouthHaven in recruiting a
coordinator and 6 Youth Ambassadors to design and implement YouthHaven.
The initiators of the YouthHaven project are: Barbara Tinney, Executive
Director NHFA, Dr. Marjorie Rosenthal, Pediatrician and Assistant Director
of the Yale RWJF Clinical Scholars Program, RWJF Clinical Scholars, Drs
Nurit Harari and Anita Vashi, Georgina Lucas, Deputy Director of the Yale
RWJF Clinical Scholars Program and Dr. Emily Wang, internist and Director of
the Transitions Health Clinic.



For questions about the project, please contact either Marjorie Rosenthal at
marjorie.rosenthal@yale.edu or Barbara Tinney at
barbara.tinney@nhfamilyalliance.org







Citywide Youth Coalition, Inc.

71 Orange St

New Haven, CT 06510

(203) 464-7838

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