Your post is consistent with what I have learned. I suspect, but don't know for sure, that the application of these methodologies for countering violence in black neighborhoods follows the same path as most other programs developed to address public problems. Namely, the interventions happen during times when the problem becomes intolerable and there is pressure on bureaucrats to do something about it. The interventions work well or not at all, but either way they get dropped when the heat is off the politicians. Then some new fad is implemented which may be the opposite of the one that worked.
In Portland during the Nineties and thereafter we had a very active Gang Unit in the police department. Officers who worked in it had a special interest in working with kids who were in the gangs or at least peripheral, but were not hardened criminals (yet). In the summer of 2020 Joann Hardesty, who is a black activist and former elected City Council member, decided that anti-gang interventions by the police were racist because "they targeted black people" and pushed successfully for defunding and dissolution of these police units. The people of Portland also elected as D.A. Mike Schmidt, who campaigned on a platform that included his opposition to incarceration. (Yes, seriously!) Hardesty was voted out of office in November of 2022, and a guy named Rene Gonzalez, who campaigned on a relatively harder law and order platform won her Council seat. I was surprised and relieved that Portlanders were actually willing to get rid of Hardesty, but I am not seeing much reduction in gang related violence and theft so far. Gonzalez can't do it all on his own, obviously, when the D.A. continues with his anti law enforcement stance, as does a high percentage of Portlanders, and their elected representatives in the state government.
Your post is consistent with what I have learned. I suspect, but don't know for sure, that the application of these methodologies for countering violence in black neighborhoods follows the same path as most other programs developed to address public problems. Namely, the interventions happen during times when the problem becomes intolerable and there is pressure on bureaucrats to do something about it. The interventions work well or not at all, but either way they get dropped when the heat is off the politicians. Then some new fad is implemented which may be the opposite of the one that worked.
In Portland during the Nineties and thereafter we had a very active Gang Unit in the police department. Officers who worked in it had a special interest in working with kids who were in the gangs or at least peripheral, but were not hardened criminals (yet). In the summer of 2020 Joann Hardesty, who is a black activist and former elected City Council member, decided that anti-gang interventions by the police were racist because "they targeted black people" and pushed successfully for defunding and dissolution of these police units. The people of Portland also elected as D.A. Mike Schmidt, who campaigned on a platform that included his opposition to incarceration. (Yes, seriously!) Hardesty was voted out of office in November of 2022, and a guy named Rene Gonzalez, who campaigned on a relatively harder law and order platform won her Council seat. I was surprised and relieved that Portlanders were actually willing to get rid of Hardesty, but I am not seeing much reduction in gang related violence and theft so far. Gonzalez can't do it all on his own, obviously, when the D.A. continues with his anti law enforcement stance, as does a high percentage of Portlanders, and their elected representatives in the state government.
https://www.opb.org/news/article/portland-mayor-ted-wheeler-changes-city-police-bureau/