The Community Prevention Grants Program incorporates the concept of maximizing the return on limited Federal funds. In the current environment of limited resources, effective leverage of existing funds is critical. The Community Prevention Grants Program process has helped position many communities to tap into other Federal, State and local public and private monies.
In many communities, the community mobilization and comprehensive planning process are key factors that enable them to secure additional funding. As many State and Federal agencies now require grant applicants to have in place a collaborative board and to conduct a risk or needs assessment, current and past Program subgrantees are finding themselves at a distinct advantage.
In Eloy, Arizona, for example, engaging in the Title V process gave the community the opportunity and skills necessary to strategically mobilize and look at community risk and protective factors. By providing the community with a process to follow that matched the requirements needed to apply for additional grants, the Community Prevention Grants Program ultimately positioned the community to leverage two other major grants: a State Incentive grant and a Drug Free Communities [Support] Grant. Having multiple sources of funding with a collaborative component also has helped to institutionalize in the community the principles of community collaboration and planning.
"Title V helped us to crystalize every prevention initiative that the [PPB] is sponsoring. It helped position us for the other grants"
— Ralph Varela, PPB Member,
Pinal Hispanic Council, Eloy, Arizona
Having a pre-existing board in place helped Mansfield, Ohio leverage additional funds. Once their Title V grant ended, the PPB's ongoing commitment to identifying and securing additional resources paid off. The community was able to obtain Federal, State and local funding. In addition, PPB members are convinced that funding applications submitted by a community board carry more weight with funders than do single agency applications. Representing all facets of a community, the PPB demonstrates to funders a broad level of community support for prevention, often a key factor in funding decisions.
In addition to the community mobilization and assessment requirement, incorporated into the Community Prevention Grants Program is an evaluation requirement that forces communities to document the process and outcomes of their prevention efforts, and track changes in both risk factors and juvenile problem behaviors. The Community Prevention Grants Program process encourages communities to set performance benchmarks and to use hard data to measure progress. Documentation of success lends credibility to a grant application and, therefore, increases a community's chances of leveraging additional resources. Although many communities struggle to understand evaluation and develop and implement an evaluation plan, those who do find that evaluation helps them to both understand the impact of community prevention strategies on risk and protective factors and to leverage additional funds.
Having a rigorous evaluation component allowed Monmouth County, New Jersey to document the success of their Community Prevention Grants Program efforts—which included reductions in both detentions and suspensions in the local elementary and middle schools. More important, the community used the evaluation results to help strengthen requests for additional funding which they have secured from a variety of sources including OJJDP, the Governor's Council on Alcohol and Drug Abuse, and the Substance Abuse Mental Health Services Administration (SAMSHA).
The Community Prevention Grants Program gave Klamath County, Oregon something more than the money to start new projects. The evaluation requirement helped them to understand the benefit to tracking and reporting data, which ultimately positioned them to obtain other funds. In tracking their progress, the community has been able to empirically demonstrate the success of their juvenile delinquency prevention and youth peer court coordinators. The data has helped the community present to potential funders a strong case for maintaining these two key positions. To date, the community has received funds from the local United Way, the Oregon Community Foundation, and ACCESS, a local community action group.
In Farmington Hills, Michigan, the PPB was able to leverage a sizable City contribution. Based on the continued success of the Farmington Hill's Title V-sponsored after-school recreation centers— enrollment has increased from 1,200 middle school children in 1997 to 2,000 in 1999 and services continue to expand to meet demand and need—and the common agenda shared among City Council and PPB members to invest in the future of Farmington Hill's children, the City Council has committed $100,000 a year, over the next ten years, to support the community's Title V initiative. With a total allocation of $1 million, Farmington Hills intends to further expand the scope of after-school programming, but hopes now to have the resources necessary to reach the high-school population as well as those in middle-school.
This section provides encouraging evidence that the Community Prevention Grants Program model is creating community change, perhaps in ways that were not anticipated. Participation in the Program has helped communities across the nation develop community perspectives based on collaboration and inclusion, access previously unavailable information and resources, and create systems-level, community-wide change. The Community Prevention Grants Program is achieving its goals. Across the Nation, communities have been empowered to create focused, coordinated, and sustainable change to address juvenile crime and delinquency in a meaningful way.