National Initiative for Building Community Trust and Justice

The National Initiative for Building Community Trust & Justice (NI) was designed to improve relationships and increase trust between communities and the criminal justice system and advance the public and scholarly understandings of the issues contributing to those relationships.

The Office of Justice Programs (US Department of Justice) launched the NI in 2014 around three core areas: implicit bias, procedural justice, and reconciliation. Trust-building interventions including officer training, departmental policy changes, and police-community engagement took place in six pilot sites:

  • Birmingham, Alabama
  • Ft. Worth, Texas
  • Gary, Indiana
  • Minneapolis, Minnesota
  • Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
  • Stockton, California

Highlights of CPE’s contribution to the NI was the implementation of implicit bias trainings in police departments and the development of community-facing procedural justice training. CPE is also providing individualized policy analyses for each NI city police department to be completed by the end of 2019.

In collaboration with the Department of Justice, the NI was led by the National Network for Safe Communities at John Jay College of Criminal Justice, and in partnership with Yale Law School, the Urban Institute, and the Center for Policing Equity.

Read the full National Initiative for Building Community Trust and Justice report.

LINK TO FULL STUDY