Violence Interrupted: Salinas Outreach Workers Pound Pavement to Quell Gang Violence

Updated 8/9/13 2:05pm

Something was up. Boys sprinting through a Salinas park is one thing, but this group of teens seemed to be running a kid down. The Interrupter knew something was wrong.

“They’re after him,” thought the Interrupter, who’d just pulled up in his car. The man called the rest of the team, who were close behind. They followed the pack of boys away from the park and to a busy Salinas street, where it looked like the fleeing kid had run out of breath.

There, on the sidewalk and in full view of traffic, a fight broke out: looked like six on one. At this point, it seemed, the kids didn’t care who was watching.

“Get outta here,” commanded one of the interrupters, as they approached the scene. The kids scrambled. It had worked. The interrupters had done their job: Interrupted violence.

In February, Salinas nonprofit 2nd Chance Youth Services started Project Safe Neighborhoods, a federally-funded, two-year program that establishes the Violence Interrupters. The interrupters are a group of four outreach workers who pound the pavement in an attempt to quell the city’s bloodshed.  

“That’s what we do all day long,” says one Interrupter, a burly man with a neck tattoo. “On the streets, connecting with people.” The two interrupters interviewed for this story asked for their names to remain anonymous, due to the dangerous nature of their work.

The interrupters’ mission is to bring direct services to the community, says Ruben Urzua, who coordinates the program for 2nd Chance out of the Silver Star Resource Center in Salinas. The interrupters go to certain hotspots known for gang activity, and offer their expertise. One man is a grief counselor and a reverend. Also in their sights: schools, libraries, parks, even the homes of youth they know.

The interrupters take a "healing approach," Urzua says. They build relationships on the streets, and offer services that the nonprofit is equipped with. They can help hook people up with jobs, counseling, or with other agencies. 

The challenge is getting skeptical kids to accept them. That’s why they return, day after day.

“It’s kind of rough when we first started, because the youth that would see us weren’t really sure what we were all about,” says an Interrupter wearing a 2nd Chance hat, part of the uniform. “They didn’t know know if we were part of law enforcement, or what have you. But, with our consistency, slowly but surely we were able to connect with these kids.”

That consistency paid off during the sidewalk rumble—a fight they just chanced upon. If the interrupters hadn’t already been known faces, the kids may have ignored them, they say.

Urzua stresses that policing is not what the interrupters do, nor do they carry weapons. That case was an extreme one, which demanded immediate attention. 

"The majority of the time we're there with our presence, and connecting [youth] to resources," he says.

The Violence Interrupters model has seen success in cities like Chicago and Boston. But in Salinas, the program works a little differently. In larger cities, interrupters are often ex-gang members who still have some status on the streets—still have pull with the gang world, Urzua says. But that approach won’t work in Salinas, which is a smaller city and operates uniquely.

“If we try to utilize individuals who are still connected [to gang life] in some way, it would basically be putting peoples’ lives in danger,” Urzua says.

That’s why the people—including one woman—hired for the job here have intimate knowledge of the streets, but aren’t directly involved or associated. One of the men interviewed has been “out of the negative stuff” for 30 years, and another for 18.

Nevertheless, “we know the life,” says the man with the neck tattoo.

In November Salinas was one of 13 cities awarded the Department of Justice safe neighborhoods grant, and the only one in California. Chicago, Cincinnati, and Detroit, the three other cities that received major $500,000 grants, have far larger populations than Salinas.

The interrupters’ work may prove crucial in coming weeks, as the public waits to see whether the latest wave of Salinas murders has finally washed through. Since July 24, nine people have been killed, pushing the city's murder rate to 15 for the year. But 2nd Chance won’t go into any details about what they’re doing in the wake of the recent bloodshed.

“There’s spikes of violence, and when we’re there we target those areas,” says the man in the hat, simply. “We let them know we ain’t out there to arrest them, hurt them, but we’re there to offer services and support them however we can.”