SEN. HARRY REID NEWS RELEASE:
WASHINGTON, D.C.—Nevada Senators Harry Reid and John Ensign today announced more than $3.1 million for law enforcement and public safety across the state. Benefiting from these funds are the Nevada Office of the Attorney General, the City of Reno, the National Judicial College, the Boulder City Police Department, the Las Vegas Police Department, the University of Nevada Las Vegas, Clark County, The Reno-Sparks Indian Colony Tribal Court, the City of Reno and the National Council for Juvenile and Family Court Judges.
“This funding will allow numerous law enforcement agencies to better do their jobs while increasing public safety throughout Nevada,” Reid said. “I’m so happy that we’ve made an investment in job creation that has the added bonus of keeping Nevadans safe.”
“Creating jobs is one of the most pressing issues currently facing our state,” said Ensign. “This grant money will help to do this while ensuring that our law enforcement has the funds necessary to continue to protect the citizens of Nevada.”
Detailed grant information follows.
SASP Formula Program for Nevada Office of the Attorney General
Recently, the Nevada Office of the Attorney General was awarded a grant in the amount of $239,352. The funds will be put to use for the Sexual Assault Services Program Formula Program. The SASP was created by the Violence Against Women and Department of Justice Reauthorization Act of 2005 (VAWA 2005), 42 U.S.C. §14043g, and is the first federal funding stream solely dedicated to the provision of direct intervention and related assistance for victims of sexual assault. The SASP encompasses five different funding streams for states and territories, tribes, state sexual assault coalitions, tribal sexual assault coalitions and culturally specific organizations.
The SASP Formula Program directs grant dollars to states and territories to assist them in supporting rape crisis centers and other nonprofit, nongovernmental organizations that provide core services, direct intervention and related assistance to victims of sexual assault. Funds provided through the SASP Formula Grant Program are designed to supplement other funding sources directed at addressing sexual assault on the state and territorial level. Rape crisis centers and other nonprofit organizations such as dual programs providing both domestic violence and sexual violence intervention services play a vital role in assisting sexual assault victims through the healing process, as well as assisting victims through the medical, criminal justice and other social support systems.
For more information about this grant, contact the Office of Justice Program’s Office of Communications at 202-307-0703.
Smart Policing Initiative for the city of Reno
The city of Reno was awarded a grant recently in the amount of $293,640 for the Smart Policing Initiative. The initiative seeks to build upon the concepts of “offender-based” and “place-based” policing and broaden the knowledge of effective policing strategies. The most convincing research demonstrates that “place-based,” or “hotspot,” policing reduces violent crime and neighborhood disorder. This initiative addresses the need for effective policing that requires a tightly focused, collaborative approach that is measurable, is based on sound, detailed analysis and includes policies and procedures for accountability.
The city of Reno will educate the public, drug prescribers, pharmacies and patrol officers about prescription drug abuse. It will train police officers to recognize illegal possession and distribution of prescription drugs and provide them with the technology in their vehicles for identifying pills that are not in their proper container. Reno will also work with the Nevada Board of Pharmacy to see if a system can be established that will notify law enforcement of any abuse or fraud concerns related to prescription drugs.
Reno will also hold prescription drug drop-off events where drugs can be disposed of properly, preventing the abuse and protecting the environment. The Reno Police Department will partner with Washoe County Child Protective Services to identify children of drug abusers, who will be referred to the Strengthening Families program. For more information about this grant, contact the Office of Justice Program’s Office of Communications at 202-307-0703.
Innovation programs for the National Judicial College
The National Judicial College was awarded a grant recently in the amount of $371,119. The College plans to put these funds to use for field programs. The National Initiative: Encouraging Innovation: Field-Initiated Programs is designed to strengthen the criminal justice system by challenging those in the field to identify and define emerging or chronic systemic issues faced by one or more components of the criminal justice continuum (includes but not limited to law enforcement, corrections, courts and community collaborations) and to propose innovative solutions to address these issues.
It will create a best practice model for handling mental competence issues in the criminal justice system. It will assemble a collaborative panel of multidisciplinary experts, visit jurisdictions with a successful model and conduct extensive research and analysis to devise a best practices model. The College will develop a best practice model that addresses the complex and challenging issues involving mental competence at the pretrial, trial and post-trial stages of a criminal proceeding. For more information about this grant, contact the Office of Justice Program’s Office of Communications at 202-307-0703.
The Reno-Sparks Indian Colony Tribal Court to receive grant
The Reno-Sparks Colony Tribal Court will receive $263,973 from the FY09 Tribal Juvenile Accountability Discretionary Grant Program. The Tribal Court will establish and maintain programs to enable juvenile courts and juvenile probation officers to be more effective and efficient in holding juveniles accountable and reducing recidivism. It is anticipated that through juvenile court peer review, active involvement by tribal youth in the community and the guidance of juvenile probation officers, adjudicated juvenile offenders can take part in positive community building with non-offending youth activity.
The Tribal Court will target 50 youths (under 17 years of age) out of a possible 305 who are eligible. The primary goal of this project will be to develop a comprehensive juvenile justice system for the Reno-Sparks Indian Colony in order to hold youth accountable for their truant and delinquent behavior and strengthen the tribal justice system, thereby reducing the number of juvenile incidents.
The National Council for Juvenile and Family Court Judges to receive grant
The National Council of Juvenile and Family Court Judges will receive $2,454,650 from the FY 09 Child Abuse Training for Judicial and Court Personnel Program. The NCJFCJ will provide targeted training and technical assistance services to more than 30 dependency and family courts at the local and state level by utilizing the OJJDP-funded Model Courts program, tracking and disseminating performance of the participating courts’ progress in implementing best practices in child welfare and dependency cases, offering child abuse and neglect training institutes for newly appointed family court judges, developing and disseminating publications on best practices and emerging court trends and leveraging relationships with national organizations who are at the vanguard of national child welfare policy.
