[music]

Brigid Bergin: It's The Brian Lehrer Show on WNYC. I'm Brigid Bergin from the WNYC and Gothamist newsroom filling in for Brian Lehrer today and tomorrow. Now, a conversation about an experiment in rethinking public safety. For five days, several times a year, the police redirect all 911 calls from a two-block stretch of Brownsville, Brooklyn to civilians who live and work in the community.

These civilians are part of an initiative called the Brownsville Safety Alliance. What happens when public safety is in the hands of community responders, not police? What are the lessons communities can take from this experiment and hasn't made that stretch of Brownsville any safer? Joining me now are two people whose organizations help to run the Brownsville Safety Alliance.

Dana Rachlin is executive director of We Build the Block. Dushoun Almond, better known as Bigga, runs the anti-gun violence initiative Brownsville In Violence Out. Also with us, New York Times NYPD Bureau Chief Maria Cramer, who documented one of those weeks in April when civilians like Dana and Bigga responded to 911 calls. I'm glad we've got you all together. Dana, Bigga, Maria, welcome to WNYC.

Maria Cramer: Thank you.

Dana Rachlin: Thank you.

Bigga: Thank you. Thank you for the invite.

Brigid Bergin: Maria, before our guests from Brownsville In Violence Out and We Build the Block tell us about their work, can you start telling us how this experiment, as you call it in your story, came about and when it began?

Maria Cramer: The experiment, the Brownsville Safety Alliance, formed in 2020 as a result of conversations that the commander of the 73rd Precinct at the time, Terrell Anderson, had with people like Dana and Bigga about how well, one, the police and the community could build more trust between them, but also how the neighborhood could be safer and what role the neighborhood itself could take in that. Out of these conversations came the Brownsville Safety Alliance, which had its first five-day session, I guess, if you will, I believe, and Dana and Bigga will correct me, in December of that year.

Dana Rachlin: Yes, 2020 in December.

Bigga: Yes, that would be 2020.

Brigid Bergin: Perfect. Maria, can you just talk about why this stretch of Brownsville?

Maria Cramer: It changed actually. The first time when I went in April, it took place on Pitkin Avenue. In that first year, it was on Mother Gaston Boulevard, which is close by. The idea was you wanted to be able to be with the people who need the help the most, the high-risk individuals of Brownsville. Also, you wanted to be in an area where there was high foot traffic.

Because in addition to having residents respond to crime, you also have community groups out there trying to connect residents of Brownsville with resources that they might otherwise not have known about. Anything from childcare and free pre-natal care, addiction recovery, on domestic violence prevention. You want it to be in an area that not only has a lot of need, but you also want an area that has a lot of foot traffic because you want to connect as many people as possible with the resources that are in this community.

Brigid Bergin: Dana and Bigga, I want to bring you into this conversation too obviously. How much of a battle was it to bring this experiment to this part of Brownsville? Dana, do you want to kick things off?

Dana Rachlin: Sure. I think it's important to talk about historical context and what led us to this moment, which was the absolute grit, determination, all the words you could think of that come with that by the elected officials in Brownsville, by the people of Brownsville, by the community groups in Brownsville to separate themselves from a police department that was exacting violence and harm on them instead of creating safety.

That happened in June where they were able to fight to get a police commander that they felt was going to speak to their needs. It set a precedent around communities, particularly communities that are overpoliced and considered high crime, being able to identify who they want as their commander. When we use terms like "quality of life," we don't want to just prescribe quality of life to NYCD to decide. Quality of life should be determined by the people that live there.

In fighting to get Terrell Anderson to the 73rd Precinct, it created some space for important conversations to happen. I want us to be really thoughtful here in how we talk about partnership. What made the BSA successful and work was because Inspector Terrell Anderson really believed in this. He understood that there were constant foot posts in a place that resulted in a police-involved shooting, that resulted in drive-by shootings, that resulted in horrible police violence.

Having foot posts and omnipresence on the block was not netting results that equal safety for anybody. He saw the resources and the assets that exist. The natural resources of Brownsville are people like Bigga and groups like BIVO and others. He managed up and said, "I want to have a real partnership and do this thing." I want us to be understanding that it's about genuine belief that something different is possible. I really appreciate that about Inspector Anderson.

Brigid Bergin: Well, let's talk a little bit about some of the work your organizations do. Bigga, let's start with you. Could you introduce our listeners to Brownsville In Violence Out, which, and I now know from Dana, I think is called BIVO, and what kind of work it does in the community?

Bigga: First and foremost, thank you for even having me on here. I appreciate it. This is a big opportunity for me and BIVO. We are CAMBA's first anti-gun violence program with section in Brownsville, Brooklyn. Our catchment ranges, I don't know if you're familiar with the streets, all the way from East New York Avenue all the way up to the lakes and from Chester all the way down to Putnam.

I just wanted to make that clear. We don't have all of Brownsville, but we have a large section of it. We started this, what is it, nine years ago, Brownsville In Violence Out. One of our participants came up with the name Brownsville In Violence Out. We've been moving forward from that. Some of the resources that we-- We like to call it "wraparound service providers."

We connect our participants, which they call in some of the places high-risk men and women. We connect them with some of the resources that they may not know exist or just can't get to. Some of the resources are job training, schools, Medicaid, mental health services. We've been doing it. When Terrell Anderson came with the idea of BSA, it was like second-hand nature for us to add on our credibility in the community, which made it so much more better.

Brigid Bergin: Dana, talk to us a little bit about how your work with We Build the Block and the Brownsville Safety Alliance also runs. Is it similar to or compares to the work or compliments, I should say, the work that BIVO is doing and then what the NYPD's role is here during this experiment?

Dana Rachlin: Sure. We Build the Block is kind of all over Brooklyn doing different things. We do direct service work with individuals that are impacted by gun violence. We partner with BIVO to do circles with young men who are at the intersection of IPV and gun violence. The BSA deputizes those young men and turns them into leaders and guardians of safety in their own community. It demonstrates what is possible for those young men and switches the narrative around who they are and what they represent in the community.

The work that we do at We Build the Block is very much looking at-- Again, the natural resources of a community is the people that live there, and seeing how we can make small policy changes or strategic changes to policy in order to deliver actual public safety where everybody feels safe. I think just to say one thing about safety. I think if you read the story and you read about Alicia, the woman who we met at the BSA, she's very unsafe. She is entitled to safety.

The police engaging with her would mean arrest or involuntary commitment. That doesn't make her any more safe. In fact, it makes her less safe. We're strategically thinking about our role in helping organizations and agencies, city and state, and law enforcement partners to work collaboratively to drive new policies and protocols that actually deliver safety for everybody.

As far as the role the NYPD plays, I'm not sure if people know this, but the 911 system is owned by the NYPD. It's impossible to get 911 calls or 311 calls without the NYPD. They don't share that information. Citizen app can try to compete, but it's nothing like sharing the call that come over in real time. The officers that are assigned to the BSA, they're picked by the commander.

They're with us in between BSA events so that they could participate in the meetings, get to know the resources and the people that have the resources so that even when a BSA is not happening, they know who to call to actually connect people that help that they might encounter, and then they sit on the block. As calls come over in the catchment, they give the calls over to BIVO in real time. There's no lapse in between a call. In fact, it's quicker because we're actually on the block. There's no lapse of time between a call coming over and BIVO getting it and responding. I just want to clarify. If, let's say, there was a shooting, God forbid, that's not a call that's going to get diverted to BIVO, right?

Brigid Bergin: It's not all 911 calls?

Dana Rachlin: It's not all 911 calls, but there's been assaults, attempted robberies, burglaries, things of that nature. Then there's also what the NYPD would call "pickup jobs." Bigga and I were in involved in a pickup job, seeing somebody walk by to go to a fight that was happening in the bodega that was already broken up. Somebody comes later with a firearm. Now, what does that look like?

Brigid Bergin: We're going to talk a little bit more about some of those, but I want to make sure that I make clear. Listeners, you can join this conversation. We can take your calls on the Brownsville community public safety experiment for New York Times reporter Maria Cramer. She's written about it. Several times a year, the police take a step back from the most part and let civilians respond to certain 911 calls at a two-block stretch of Brownsville, Brooklyn.

We want to hear from you. We want to hear your questions. If you're a resident in Brownsville and you've experienced this, we'd love to hear from you. How have you experienced it in your neighborhood? The number is 212-433-WNYC. That's 212-433-9692. You can also text us at 212-433-9692. I'm speaking with Dana Rachlin, executive director of We Build the Block, and Dushoun Almond, aka Bigga, who runs the anti-violence initiative Brownsville In Violence Out, also known as BIVO.

We also have New York Times NYPD Bureau Chief Maria Cramer. Excuse me. Bigga and Dana, I want to go back to you. Your organizations are doing work year-round to promote and improve community well-being. That doesn't necessarily mean responding to 911 calls year-round. During those weeks when the police do redirect the 911 calls to organizations like yours, how much different is a typical day given the work and missions of your organizations? Bigga, you want to take that first?

Bigga: Well, it doesn't necessarily have to be a 911 call. We're on the street daily anyway. We canvass daily in our community. We may see something that may be a 911 call to just a call isn't made yet, but we take care of it anyway. We specialize in mediating situations that can lead to violence or gun violence. It might not always be a 911 call. At the 911 call, we're trying to get it to the point where all of those little things where we can assist our community and partner with the NYPD as far as, "We're going to take care of this. You go take care of something else." We're trying to do that all the time. It works out better for our community and the communication is better. We're always trying to do that.

Brigid Bergin: Dana, how about you?

Dana Rachlin: I would just say that anybody who's doing direct service work with individuals that are living on the margins and experiencing the worst of state and community violence, it's a game of trying to track down resources for people. When we talk about resources, I want to be really specific. It's about getting people birth certificates and Social Security cards because they're transitional and they've been lost.

It's about getting them their state IDs. It's about connecting them with childcare vouchers, clearing up warrants, doing criminal court advocacy, job placement. Very, very tangible, specific things that the city has, right? They're supposed to be getting those things, but getting to those things is challenging, especially if you're transient, especially if you're high-risk, especially if you don't trust the system because you've been harmed by it, if you don't have your documents, if you don't have money to retrieve documents.

People think I'm crazy when I say it, but I promise you, it could take eight months to get somebody their birth certificate, Social Security card, and their state ID. Once they have that, then they have entrance into all these other things, right? I would say that we're always, every day, playing a game of, "How do we get all of the things that our participants deserve to them?" The BSA is actually a way for us to try to do that in real time because those resources are on the block. We had IDNYC truck come out one day at the BSA.

We're working on getting warrants cleared up for the next BSA, connecting people to medical support, mental health support. All of those things are happening then in real time and all those people are actually on the block for us to walk people over to a table and say, "Hey, this is who you need to talk to to get a medical appointment in the neighborhood." It's an enhancement. It brings the resources right to where people are and remove some of the barriers that our participants face daily.

Brigid Bergin: Bigga, in the article, and Dana started to talk about it as well, Maria wrote about how during the Safety Alliance Week in April in her piece, you talked about how you convinced a man going into a bodega with a gun to hand over his weapon. Then the next day, you see the same guy. Now, he wants to volunteer with you and that he's even broken up a few fights since then. How often do you have that experience when responding to a 911 call as part of this initiative, maybe actually bring someone into the work that you do?

Bigga: Well, like I said before, we do this all the time. During the Brownsville Safety Alliance, it was even more special because we gave them something to look forward to. Don't get me wrong. He didn't just hand over a pistol. He was given something to focus on, something to believe in that this was going to help. Until this day, that same young man, he's working. He believed in what we was doing at the Brownsville Safety Alliance. He got the opportunity to show that he can be productive, not just destructive. From that, it just birthed him putting something in his pocket and giving him something to believe in work.

Dana Rachlin: I want to add here too. This sounds like fantasy or something else, but there is a wonderful researcher. His name is Dr. Brotherton out of John Jay. He has proven across the globe that when you bring people into the fold who are committing the harm or violence, and not only give them resources but also empower them to be a part of the safety apparatus, safety will dramatically drop down. Please, google Dr. Brotherton. Look at his writings. It's all rooted in what him and I both share this word as "radical love."

This is how you deliver safety is by bringing people in, making them have not just a seat at the table but giving them the tools to be a part of that safety ecosystem or apparatus, and then connecting them with the resources that they need to become stabilized and whatnot. I don't want it to sound like this is, one, something we alone are doing or, two, something miraculous that can't be replicated. In fact, it's proven across the globe, not even just New York or this country.

Brigid Bergin: Well, let's go to James in Brooklyn who has a question that maybe, Bigga or Dana, you can respond to. James, welcome to The Brian Lehrer Show.

James: Thank you. I was hoping somebody could just talk me through what de-escalating potentially-violent verbal conversation looks like before things go south. I run across this with some frequency and sounds like you guys are doing great work.

Bigga: Well, I could tell you on my angle, the first thing we do is use our credibility to make sure the person knows us or knows others. 99.9% of the time, they do. Well, in both cases, if they do or they don't, I like to mirror back to them what they're saying and how it makes sense and how it holds value over your life. If you are trying to talk to somebody, if you're trying to hurt somebody, if somebody's trying to say they want to hurt somebody or do something, let it be known that it's not ever going to end the way you want it to end.

Then from that, we start the thought process of de-escalating what's going to help you feel better about this situation. Now, like I tell everybody when I do an interview, we are not an unrealistic organization where everything's going to be dealt with a conversation. There are some things in our communities. People may not like it, but there are some things that people are going to want to fight over. What we try to convince them to do is to not kill each other. If I can just get a young man or a young woman, "Hey, listen, if you all could just fight and it'd be over or anything else, any other form of communication would be better than firing a gun and trying to kill each other."

Dana Rachlin: Just to echo that though, I want to be clear here because we are talking about Brownsville and there is a narrative about Brownsville. What Bigga is talking about is not some kind of fight club or Hamsterdam. It is not that, right? We are talking about what we all see in America, right? America shows us violence every day. We hear about any place in any state in this country talking about a road-related incident or you knocked on the wrong door for shoes and you get killed.

We have a cultural issue across the nation. What Bigga is talking about is being realistic and responding with tools to keep people safe and keep people alive. It's a harm-reduction model. We need to be thinking about harm reduction in terms of violence similar to how we do in terms of substances. All of the participants that we share went through a harm-reduction training called Stop the Bleed.

They learned how to make the kits to make sure that we could save somebody's life in case they're stabbed or shot or hit by a car or something. They learned CPR and that's harm reduction. Again, it's about community keeping themselves safe, right? We know it could take a long time for an ambulance to get down a block or to get to a hospital. What Bigga is talking about is harm reduction. It shouldn't be taken out of characterization of, "This is some kind of fight club or Hamsterdam or mayhem."

Bigga: Not at all.

Dana Rachlin: In fact, to argue that the BSA and the work that BIVO does daily is keeping order, is keeping people safe, is delivering on what public safety should look like. Whereas over-policing, constant system involvement creates chaos and crisis and destabilization.

Brigid Bergin: I want to bring in another caller. David in Howard Beach. David, welcome to WNYC. Tell us about--

David: Thank you for taking the call.

Brigid Bergin: Go ahead.

David: Okay. Your idea, I think it's wonderful, but it reminded me of the experience I had as a new teacher when New York City schools were decentralized. The ostensive reason for decentralizing the schools was to provide community control at a local level, which is what you described in the effort that you're talking about today.

What happened was the whole system of appointing, especially supervisors, was taken over by the existing political establishment, the political parties, and then other interest groups who wanted to see their people get the jobs. The union had not necessarily the most positive role in that. I would recommend that you keep an eye out if it's going to be instituted throughout the city that you try to minimize the amount of impact outside political forces can have on giving community input or control.

Brigid Bergin: David, thanks for your call.

Dana Rachlin: Could we also provide some context here? Because in Brownsville, the assembly member, Walker, was talking about this last night. In the '70s, there was the issues with the teachers union and destroying schools that were, Black, Black-run, and that destabilized the community. I think the reverse is true about public safety. The political interest exists in the current public safety apparatus.

What we're trying to do here is decentralize from those special interests and deliver and have things go downstream to the community level where there could be real assessment about what is needed. How do we deliver it? How culturally are things assessed? Is that quality of life? Because I say it's quality of life or is that a quality of life issue because somebody in the community believes it's a quality of life issue, et cetera? I just wanted to be mindful that there's a difference here, in that I think that the opposite is true in public safety from schools.

Brigid Bergin: We're coming towards the end of the segment. Dana, I want to ask you about one of the moments in Maria's story that captures an interaction you shared with a young woman named Alicia. I think you started to talk about it before. Can you tell us about that moment and what you think you were able to do for her that maybe police aren't able to do or are not trained to do?

Dana Rachlin: I just want to give a lot of credit here. Big shout-out to Tiffany from BIVO, who when we lost sight of Alicia as we were trying to plan and do some care coordination, she ran and found her down the block. I think that what we were able to do in that moment is make her feel safe, make her feel seen. We found out it was her 23rd birthday. We had lunch with her. We listened to her talk about her life.

Brigid Bergin: Where did you meet her?

Dana Rachlin: We were on the block and she was pushed out of a moving vehicle. The BIVO team immediately went to her aid. She was quite visibly upset as anybody would be being pushed out of a moving vehicle. Not only were they able to calm her down and make sure that she herself was safe and that they were safe and the community was safe, they were able to start that care coordination that I'm talking about. What are the things that she needs and who do we know that has it? That's how we met her. I don't know. Maria, Bigga, we spent, what, six hours with her just talking to her?

Bigga: You're underdoing it. It was more than seven hours.

Dana Rachlin: It was more than seven hours. The BSA was over. Everybody had packed up and--

Maria Cramer: It was getting very cold.

Dana Rachlin: It was really cold. When I talk about resources, this is what I mean. She needed her ID. She had no ID. She had no money. She needed a phone so that we could follow up with her and get that care coordination going beyond what would happen at that moment. She really needed people that understand what public health interventions look like.

Do I think she needed to be hospitalized? Absolutely not. Do I think she needed to be incarcerated? Absolutely not. Do I think she needs to be connected to long-term care that will help her physically like her physical health and her mental health? Absolutely. We were trying to do that in real time on the block on a Friday evening. It's not easy to get people on the phone on a Friday evening to assist with this.

Brigid Bergin: As we're running out of time, Maria, I want to thank you for graciously being here with us and for the work you did writing and reporting this story, bringing some visibility to the hard work that Dana and Bigga are doing in the community. From your perspective, I'm wondering, are there takeaways? Are there lessons? Do we anticipate seeing this replicated in other parts of the city or even beyond as far as you know?

Maria Cramer: I think that, yes, that's a really good question because this is an effort that relies on people really believing in it and sticking with it. As I was watching Bigga and Dana with Alicia in particular, I was struck by all the hours that they spent with her in the cold on the phone just trying to help this one person and the effort that it took. It fell on me that this is a very fragile alliance. In some ways, it's strong in the sense that the infrastructure is there and the commitment is there, but it relies on people sticking with it and believing in it.

It is hard, hard work. It relies on this kind of commitment. You need to have buy-in from multiple people and you need to have cohesion from multiple agencies and organizations. To that end, the city is investing. You are seeing $2.1 million over a three-year period going into getting these resources together so that people like Alicia can be helped in real time in a much more cohesive way.

It relies on the police still being involved and willing to participate in this and refer the 911 calls to people like Bigga and Dana. It relies on people like Bigga and Dana, more people like Bigga and Dana being able to commit to something like this, this tremendous hard work. That's the takeaway I got on this is that there's a fragility to it. It relies so much on people just being able to stick with it.

Brigid Bergin: We're going to have to leave it there for now. I want to thank our guests. Dana Rachlin, executive director of We Build the Block, Dushoun Almond, aka Bigga from Brownsville In Violence Out, also known as BIVO, and Maria Cramer, NYPD Bureau Chief for The New York Times. Thanks to you all for joining me.

Dana Rachlin: Thank you for having us.

Bigga: Appreciate for having us. I just wanted to say real quick. If you want to see what BIVO was doing, you want to see our news articles, look at our page at camba.org, and you can look us up anytime.

Copyright © 2023 New York Public Radio. All rights reserved. Visit our website terms of use at www.wnyc.org for further information.

New York Public Radio transcripts are created on a rush deadline, often by contractors. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. Accuracy and availability may vary. The authoritative record of New York Public Radio’s programming is the audio record.