NYC expanding violence interrupter model at Woodside and Astoria Houses
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ALFONSO VALLINAS speaks out at a rally following the stray bullet killing of his WIFE GUDELIA VALLINAS at the Woodside Houses last month. PHOTO BY WALTER KARLING
By David Brand
New York City will soon increase the role of so-called violence interrupters at two Western Queens public housing complexes where shootings have spiked, officials said Monday.
The Woodside Houses and Astoria Houses, both located in the 114th Precinct, will be the latest focus areas of the city’s crisis management system, which funds mediation and community services for people at risk of gun violence. The model relies on credible messengers — community members with street experience also known as violence interrupters — to diffuse conflicts and connect residents with counseling, employment, education and other services.
The city’s decision comes after three people were shot around the Woodside Houses last month. The victims included Gudelia Vallinas, a 37-year-old mother of two killed by a stray bullet March 12.
Queens Borough President Donovan Richards described the plan to increase the number of violence interrupters at the two public housing complexes during a meeting with community board leaders and Police Commissioner Dermot Shea Monday.
“We’ve been working very closely with the mayor’s office and will be making some announcements on expanding the crisis management system and the Cure Violence program out in both Woodside Houses and Astoria Houses,” Richards said. “It’s something I’ve been working with the mayor on and gotten the green light on it.”
City officials confirmed the plan to expand the crisis management system at the two complexes Tuesday. The organization Community Capacity Development will implement the program within the 114th Precinct, which includes Astoria, Long Island City, Woodside and Jackson Heights.
While murders and shootings have drastically decreased in the precinct neighborhoods over the past three decades, both have ticked up over the past year.
There have been three murders and seven gunshot victims in the 114th Precinct this year as of April 4, NYPD reporting shows. There were two murders and one gunshot victim in the precinct over the same time period last year.
The move to expand the crisis management system in the Astoria Houses and Woodside Houses formalizes the work already being done by violence interrupters in those communities, said K. Bain, the executive director of Community Capacity Development. Bain founded the organization Build the Block 696, which employs credible messengers to prevent violence and provide services to residents at the Queensbridge Houses, the largest public housing complex in the country.
Violent crime has plummeted at the complex over the past several years. Bain said the decrease is based in large part on the work of violence interrupters and opportunities for young people at housing complexes throughout the region.
“We have already been doing the work for the past six or seven years in the Woodside Houses and Astoria Houses. We just haven’t had a budget to do it,” Bain said. “In order to maintain and to protect the quality of life and reduce the violence in the Queensbridge Houses, we have had to work with Woodside, Ravenswood and Astoria.”
In 2017, residents of the Queensbridge Houses marked a whole year without shooting — an achievement that would have seemed unlikely only a few years earlier.
“There’s no way you can have over 365 days without a shooting or killing in the largest housing project in North America and not have peace agreements, mediations, food distributions in these other places,” he said.
Bain said the city will provide additional funding to his organization to enable them to expand their presence in the Woodside and Astoria Houses.
“We’ve been doing the work to the best of our ability without resources,” he said.
