INDIANAPOLIS — When it comes to solutions, Indianapolis continues to enhance its violence reduction plan. As students prepare for summer break, city leaders tell WRTV that elevating their summer experience is key to fighting crime.
"That's the message we want to carry forward, and we want to encourage folks to choose peace instead of violence," said Dane Nutty, President and CEO of the Indy Public Safety Foundation.
That message has been ringing across Indianapolis for three years.
"Indy Peace is the program name, and that's a partnership between the Office of Public Health and Safety and the Indy Public Safety Foundation that was established in January 2022 as part of the city's overall gun violence reduction strategy," Nutty said.
According to Nutty, nationwide, most gun violence peaked in large cities in 2021. Since the city rolled out its violence reduction plan, they have noticed a difference.
"We've seen over a 30% reduction in criminal homicides and non-fatal shootings since that time. So, we've kind of outpaced that national average, and while that's a great decline and we celebrate that trend, there's still a lot of work to be done," Nutty said.
A lot of that work will take place over the summer through various programs.
"First up, those community outreach pop-ups, so those are occurring here in the next couple of weeks," said Nutty. "We have many sports going on throughout the summer months. Our Healing Hearts transformative beats program. We heard over the last year that some young people want to learn more about the music industry."
Nutty said that with the collaborative effort of other organizations, they hope to provide young people with the resources they need and connect with them beyond the surface level.
"One really impactful learning that we've had over the past three years is that none of us can do this work alone to really, truly transform a community and to reduce violence. You need every single person, every single organization, every single business in that community to participate in some way or another," Nutty said.
For information on how to get involved, click here.
