Spotlight on OJP’s Community Capacity Development Office
February 2008
The mission of the Community Capacity Development Office (CCDO) is to promote comprehensive strategies to reduce crime and revitalize communities. CCDO helps communities help themselves, enabling them to prevent, control, and reduce violent crime, drug abuse, and gang activity. CCDO also assists communities in promoting long-term community health and resilience and therefore strengthening community capacity to increase the quality of life.
One of the better known CCDO efforts is its Weed and Seed strategy. The strategy involves a two-pronged approach: law enforcement agencies and prosecutors cooperate in "weeding out" violent criminals and drug abusers, and public agencies and community-based private organizations collaborate to "seed" much-needed human services such as prevention, intervention, treatment, and neighborhood restoration programs. This effort has had a positive impact in communities across the country. Today, there are 277 Weed and Seed communities that are working in partnerships to weed out crime and revitalize neighborhoods.
Weeding and seeding takes the whole community. In addition to funding, CCDO offers support to community partners by facilitating training, technical assistance, and strategic planning that helps communities increase their "capacity" to improve their neighborhoods.
In addition to working with state and local partners, U.S. Attorneys' Offices, and other state and community-based organizations, CCDO has entered into a partnership with the Internal Revenue Service (IRS), which operates its Volunteer Income Tax Assistance, or VITA, centers in many Weed and Seed sites. The VITA program provides information to community residents about the Earned Income Tax Credit and the Child Tax Credit and has helped to get tax refunds to many low-income families.
Many Weed and Seed communities also have Safe Havens, multi-service centers that provide mentoring and after-school and prevention programs. Services range from gang and teen-pregnancy prevention to financial services, education, health, and adult literacy programs.
Resident and community leadership is vital to the success of community-based initiatives like Weed and Seed. And CCDO, through its partnership with NeighborWorks America, provides Weed and Seed sites with placed-based training programs on increasing the participation of community residents, developing strategic collaborations, and designing effective community sustainability strategies.
To further these efforts, in March, CCDO will convene a Strategy Development Workshop in Portland, Oregon to assist sites in all aspects of strategy implementation. The workshop will cover important topics such as grant administration, public safety, economic development, sustainability, and prevention topics. Attendees will include over 500 site coordinators, staff from U.S. Attorneys offices, and community and faith-based leaders.
More information about the Weed and Seed strategy and other CCDO activities is available at: http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/ccdo/welcome_flash.html.
