Parks-Shaw hosts violence prevention symposiums

By Max Goodwin

Kansas City recorded its deadliest year ever last year. Surpassing the 179 homicides in 2020 with 182 homicides in 2023. The enduring violence frustrated Fifth District Councilwoman and Mayor Pro-Tem Ryana Parks-Shaw who had worked with other city leaders for two years to develop a strategy to address it.

In 2020, Parks-Shaw was in her first full year as a city councilmember. Since then she’s been the most visible face from the city government on violent crime prevention methods like focused deterrence. Kansas City is in a different place than it was then. 

The city has a new police chief that is in full support. City leaders have worked together to build a plan to reduce violence called KC 360. A Violence Prevention and Intervention Fund of $30 million over five years has been created. 

Parks-Shaw reached out to Willie Barney when the year ended with its most homicide numbers ever. Barney has been nationally recognized by the Department of Justice and others for his work as Founder of the Empowerment Network in Omaha and bringing together a collaborative approach known as Omaha 360. It’s the model that KC 360 was based on.

“Mr. Barney and I were talking about this frustration and what can we do. We have to do more,” Parks-Shaw said. “We came up with the idea of a symposium because we know there’s far too many silos in Kansas City.”

Last week, Parks-Shaw led the second KC United Symposium in two months. 

City leaders gave updates on the progress of KC 360. Business leaders spoke about commitments to the plan. Director of the Bureau of Justice Assistance Karhlton Moore spoke about federal commitments to reduce violence in Kansas City. Neighborhood association leaders and program leaders discussed funding opportunities and ways to collaborate.

“In my 27 years here at KCPD, I don’t remember any time that this many leaders, groups, services, coming together like we have right now,” said KCPD Chief Stacey Graves.

Parks-Shaw, who is originally from the Hickman Mills area, recently spoke to about 40 students at Ruskin High School. Last month, Cyrus Rodgers, a KCPD Officer and Director of Safety at Ruskin, led a youth panel during a KC United session. Improving police and youth relations is a key part of KC 360. 

KC United began with a preliminary draft for Kansas City’s continued approach to reduce violence. City leaders and representatives of Omaha 360 presented the plan to community members, who then voted on top priorities of the ten-part plan. They broke into focus groups to talk about solutions in four different areas: prevention, enforcement, intervention, and re-entry. They developed a final draft for a KC 360 plan.

Melesa Johnson, Director of Public Safety for the city, was on the planning committee for KC United. She also grew up in the Hickman Mills School District. 

Johnson said there’s been a rapid increase in youth violence in south Kansas City lately. They’ve talked with youth in the area to find an answer and heard that kids want more places to go and stay busy, like community centers and other spaces. Johnson works with Kari Thompson, who leads the KCPD Community Engagement Division for the city and police departments that want to be on the same page as they find community driven solutions. 

“We’ve done a couple of taskforce visits out in south Kansas City,” Johnson said. “We were actually out on Bannister Road this week looking at a convenience store that had a host of issues, a couple of double homicides that have occurred recently there.”

That’s an example of focused deterrence, zeroing in on specific places and specific individuals who tend to be responsible for a disproportionate amount of violence. Research has found that a small percentage of people tend to be responsible for most violent crimes in each city. Additionally, a small percentage of those crimes takes place on an equally small percentage of specific city blocks.

Dr. Thomas Abt, Founder of the National Violence Reduction Center, explained this at the most recent KC United Symposium.

“The fact of the matter is violence is sticky,” Abt said. “It takes decades of disinvestment to create a hotspot and it takes a lifetime of trauma to create a shooter. So, this stuff doesn’t jump around. And there are huge benefits to having this focused approach.” 

The approach needs balance though, Abt said. Violent crime is often met with two types of solutions, social programs to address root causes of crime or enforcement to arrest violent criminals. Abt said the real answer is that both are necessary.

“If you look around the country or even the world, you won’t find a city that just arrested its way out of violence,” Abt said. “But you also won’t find a city that just programmed its way out.”