CTVIP CEO Len Jahad at WNHH FM ... ... and working on the agency's garden. New Haven’s street outreach workers had a new challenge: dealing with kids as young as 11 caught up in community trouble.They also took on the new challenge of focusing on teenaged girls whose group spats could lead to bi
gger trouble.Those two challenges reflect the growing mission of the CT Violence Intervention & Prevention (VIP) project as it passes its fifth anniversary hitting the streets to defuse beefs and mentor young people in New Haven and Hamden.CEO Leonard Jahad discussed those challenges during a post-anniversary discussion on WNHH FM’s “Dateline New Haven.”Jahad started the nonprofit after a precursor agency went out of business. It has grown from four to 26 “credible messengers” who tackle brewing beefs and other potential violence through the trust they’ve gained on the street — either through work in the criminal justice system or a past life caught up in that system.The mission actually started in 2007 when New Haven launched a then-controversial street-outreach worker program to enlist ex-offenders to connect with young people involved in beefs. The concept has now become mainstream — and integral to violence reduction efforts — in cities across the country. Government and private philanthropic support has grown.The outreach workers have generally taken referrals for people between 13 and 24 years old. A couple of years ago, CTVIP started receiving referrals for kids as young as 11.“As far as maturity levels, we’re really not equipped to work with 11-year-olds. 13 was basically the lowest. I was like: ‘What am I supposed to do? Put him in the naughty corner or give him a timeout?’ We had to change pretty quickly,” Jahad recalled. The staff received training so it could better understand how to navigate interactions with the 11- and 12-year-olds.As the agency has grown, it has increasingly worked with teenaged girls. It now conducts a “Make Her Space” program for seventh and eighth graders in 13 Hamden and New Haven middle schools.When the “Kia Boyz” trend hit New Haven, Jahad’s team visited a counterpart agency in Milwaukee (where the social media-driven phenomenon began) to learn about what to watch for. (Members of that agency, 414 Life, have another info-sharing visit scheduled to CTVIP this Friday.) Jahad said his crew has received calls from young people they work with reporting that they were in a stolen Kia with others about to take dangerous action. In those cases, the VIP crew came to retrieve the callers. They also stuck around to try to talk down the vehicles’ remaining occupants.CT VIP’s work continues long after a single incident. Sometimes it can lead to a permanent ceasefire. Sometimes, it can still end tragically.A latter example was the murder last Nov. 22 of a 16-year-old shot near Goffe and Hudson streets.The shooting stemmed from a rivalry between different “crews” of teens that began in the spring. A group of teens had stolen a car with a dog inside.“They made an agreement that they were going to sell the dog and split the money. Then one of the guys got the idea, ‘If I hide the dog and act like it was stolen. I could keep all the money,’ ” Jahad recalled.That led to a dispute that resulted in 80 shots being fired at a house in the Rockview housing development.The police got a search warrant for the dog and returned it to its owner.Meanwhile, CTVIP worked with the disputants to settle their differences. They agreed to a truce. The truce held through the summer into the fall.Then one of the people involved posted a social media video depicting himself urinating on the grave of someone connected with the other group (apparently a somewhat common taunt). That reignited the feud, which led to the 16-year-old’s shooting death.CTVIP returned to the streets, hoping to head off the next confrontation.Jahad, who’s 57, grew up in Hamden in a family in which public service was a given, he said. He developed his relationships with offenders not as a fellow offender but as a reentry guide. He first had a career as a state corrections officer and counselor, then worked for the New Haven Adult Probation Office, where he served as chief probation officer before diving in to the original street outreach team. Meanwhile, he has taken in 12 foster children in addition to raising his two daughters. He enjoys coming to VIP’s Ashmun Street HQ each day. “It doesn’t really feel like work,” he said. It’s a mission.Click on the video below to watch the full conversation with CTVIPCEO Len Jahad on WNHHFM’s “Dateline New Haven.” Click here to subscribe or here to listen to other episodes of “Dateline New Haven.” ...read more read less
