Staff:

Carolyn Abdullah
Karen Labat

Federal-Community Partnerships Program Information

The Safe Start Initiative: A Federal-Community Partnership Program

The National Civic League's Federal-Community Partnerships (FCP) program began work on the Safe Start project, a national initiative funded by the Department of Justice's Office for Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention, in the summer of 2002. The 5.5-year project is a multi-site demonstration that seeks to show how systems reform, better coordination across agencies, and shifting resources to early intervention efforts will reduce the impact of family and community violence on young children between the ages of 0 and 6. Studies have shown that early intervention efforts dramatically decrease the rate at which abused and neglected children develop into delinquents or engage in criminal behavior as adults.
The project includes the following partner sites: Sitka, Alaska; Chatham County, North Carolina; Pinellas County, Florida; Zuni, New Mexico; Baltimore, Maryland; Chicago, Illinois; San Francisco, California; Spokane, Washington; Rochester, New York; Bridgeport, Connecticut; and Washington County, Maine. The National Civic League will serve as the national coordinator for all training and technical assistance for the initiative.
The FCP staff will assist the eleven Safe Start sites with efforts that are both prevention and intervention focused-essentially assisting these collaboratives as they grow and expand existing partnerships among mental health, child protection, domestic violence, law enforcement, courts, schools, family and legal services that ultimately improve the systemic response for children at risk of exposure or who have been exposed to violence.

About Safe Start, Fact Sheet

Safe Kids/Safe Streets, Office of Justice Programs
This demonstration focuses on reforming those systems that prevent child abuse and neglect, prosecute offenders, and serve victims and their families. The approach involves strengthening community collaboratives working to comprehensively address child abuse and neglect and subsequent fatalities in five sites across the country.

Project Updates, Fact Sheet

Recent News

The National Civic League sponsored the Fall 2003 Cross Site meeting for the Safe Start Demonstration Initiative in Sitka, Alaska on September 10-12, 2003. This year's theme was Domestic Violence in the Context of Children's Exposure to Violence. Participating national partners included the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention, National Council of Juvenile and Family Court Judges, Institute for Educational Leadership, National Center for Children Exposed to Violence, Association for the Study and Development of Community, and Caliber Associates.

Approximately 100 representatives from Safe Start sites and their respective collaborative partners convened to examine the landscape of domestic violence and children's exposure to violence issues. Discussions entailed current trends in policy development, strengthening the relationship between domestic violence and child protective service systems, developing strategies for service integration, evaluating the impact of training, systems change and integration efforts, and how to effectively collaborate and engage crucial partners on issues regarding domestic violence and children exposed to violence.

Distinguished guests included the Honorable Dale R. Koch, Presiding Judge of the Circuit Court for Multnomah County in Portland, Oregon, who offered a judicial perspective on family violence and child abuse and neglect; Lydia Walker, a nationally recognized expert in the field of domestic violence, child protective services, and children exposed to violence; and Shellie Taggart of the Massachusetts Department of Social Services Domestic Violence Unit, sharing information on their nationally recognized model for the integration of domestic violence awareness/skills into child protection casework. Lloyd Malone of the El Paso County Child Welfare Office of the Department of Human Services, and Amber Ptak of the Colorado Greenbook Initiative, both from Colorado Springs, Colorado, delivered a joint presentation on inter-organizational communication and partnerships in relation to collaboration, and effective intervention regarding child welfare, child maltreatment, and human services.

In addition, the meeting opened with a traditional Tlingit welcome from the Sitka Tribe of Alaska, and participants had the privilege of being a part of various cultural activities throughout the three days, such as seeing native dance performances and taking part in a traditional Tlingit dinner.

The National Civic League wishes to thank all of their partners and the members of the planning committee for helping to make the meeting a success. For more information on Safe Start, or contact information for any of the guest speakers, please call the Federal-Community Partnerships Office of the National Civic League at 202.783.2961.

Photos from the Sitka Cross-Site Meeting

The NCL conducted the Spring 2003 Cross-Site Meeting held May 14-16 in Pinellas County, Florida at St. Pete Beach. The theme for the meeting was "Embedding a Process of Change Today for a Sustainable Tomorrow", and addressed the following topics: collaboration in the implementation stage, and how it leads to sustainability; generating community awareness, creating community champions, and engaging the courts in our collaborative processes; sharing data and information and overcoming privacy barriers; evaluating program strategies and identifying children exposed to violence; and strengthening systems change efforts, both within agencies and across systems. The meeting was designed to focus the 11 sites on the variety of methods to ensure sustainability and provide them with tools for applying systems change strategies. The meeting concluded with a look ahead at the upcoming years of the project and outlined next steps and milestones for progressing towards sustainability. The Fall 2003 Cross-Site meeting will be held in Sitka, Alaska.

Photos from the Pinellas Cross-Site Meeting

NCL coordinated a cross-site meeting, March 18-21, 2003 in Washington, DC. Participants reflected on what lessons they had learned, what successes have been demonstrated, and what efforts will be sustained. Participants completed a comprehensive review of the achievements of the demonstration, both as individual sites and as a national initiative. The second half of the meeting focused on national priorities and trends in program focus and funding. The sites developed and presented an overview of the initiative, including highlights and accomplishments, to a panel of guests that included representatives from other federal agencies, foundations, policy organizations, and other potential funders. Meeting participants developed strategies for the practical application of Safe Kids lessons in other communities, including Safe Start communities, and determined future areas for continued collaboration.

NCL continues to broker and track technical assistance resources and support from numerous providers, including securing new partnerships with Fox Valley Technical College in Milwaukee, and the Academy for Educational Development's Community Youth Mapping Initiative. Existing relationships with the National Council of Juvenile and Family Court Judges, Alpha Consulting Group, and the Child Welfare League of America continue to be strengthened. Recently brokered topics for have included multi-disciplinary team strengthening and protocols, wraparound and integrated services modules, results-based accountability, community youth mapping, and implementation of Green Book strategies (improving systems for domestic violence/child abuse and neglect co-occurrence). Sites are continuing with multi-systems case analysis, integrating data/information systems, and unified fiscal planning, resulting from previously-brokered training and technical assistance.