Neighborhood initiative promises to reduce crime. But will it deliver?

By Ben McCarthy

After 2023 was a record setting year for homicides (with 181 recorded killings, 246 for the entire KC Metro), early final statistics for the past year show a six year low, along with a downward trend in other violent crimes (homicides recorded by the KCPD South Patrol actually rose again, from 13 last year to 18 in 2025). 

City officials are crediting crime deterrence programs for playing a substantial role, and five of Kansas City’s most violent neighborhoods will soon have a new program underway aiming to continue on-going deescalation efforts. 

Earlier this month, the City Council passed a new $2 million crime prevention initiative that will bring “community outreach figures” to those five high risk neighborhoods: Ruskin Heights, Independence Plaza, North Town Fork Creek, Marlborough Heights and Ivanhoe. 

The effort will be funded by the Violence Prevention Fund, which began in the spring of 2023, with the aim of investing $30 million over 5 years into organizations focused on violence prevention efforts. 

This door-to-door community engagement model mirrors an approach already employed by Aim4Peace (the local violence prevention program, based within the Kansas City Health Department), and is based on similar programs that have been cited for their effectiveness in other cities, such as Chicago.

Still, the program’s details remain unfinalized by those who just passed it, and those who are tasked with executing it as well as overseeing the $400,000 budgeted to their respective neighborhoods.

Who will exactly be going door-to-door in these neighborhoods?

According to those paid to oversee the program, it’s very likely that ex-convicts will be at the top of the list for the most “credible” candidates. 

Diane Herschberger is the Executive Director of the Marlborough Community Coalition, where she has lived for three decades. She says that she envisions the most viable job candidates as men who have been incarcerated and want to be in a work situation that gives back to the community. 

“These men will all have lived experience in the justice system,” Herschberger said. “That credibility will help them establish rapport with the young population.”

“Credibility” comes up time and time again in speaking with figures like Herschberger involved in the new program. 

She says the screening process will weed out anyone with domestic violence or sexual offences. Beyond that, she’s uncertain who is or isn’t eligible to serve in the positions. Herschberger promises extensive training to the men they do hire, and foresees “boots on the ground” around late February or early March. 

Mollie Manske, safety director for Mattie Rhodes, will be overseeing the Independence Plaza (old Northeast) team. She echoes Herschberger’s call for men with “lived experience” to take up the positions, canvassing the area’s most troubled neighborhoods and connecting with “high-risk individuals.”

“Maybe they’ve been incarcerated for drugs or gun charges,” Manske said. “But they’ve done the work and now want to offer personal testimony.”

“This is a very unique job, not everyone can do it.” 

Despite the positions being allocated as full-time, those contracted to run the program throughout the five neighborhoods say the people they hire will not actually go out into the community before mid-afternoon, 2:30pm or 3pm at the earliest. Marlborough is setting aside $300,000 of the $400,000 they receive to pay their 7-person outreach team in 2026. 

In the Ruskin Heights neighborhood, Marva Moses, founder of Hickman Mills Prevention Coalition, expenditures will include billboards, other ads, and creating a QR code to enhance awareness of the program. She anticipates her 7-man team will receive about $35,000 to 40,000 individually for the year’s work, with at least 4 team members working by mid-January. 

After a still-to-be-determined training period is complete, the men will hit the ground.

Can they be armed for self-defense? What might they be armed with?

“This is dangerous work we’re talking about,” Moses said. “They will have to be trained and definitely be armed with good verbal and non-verbal skills.” 

According to Rashid Junaid, program manager of Aim4Peace, the men in these outreach positions will not be allowed to carry weapons of any kind. He is less certain as to whether or not he and Aim4Peace will have ultimate authority over the hiring and training process. He expects that they will consult with the five neighborhoods and believes the contracts give the city a certain level of power to guide the process. 

Moses, the 2025 recipient of the KC People’s Choice Lifetime Achievement award, is working to have Hickman Mills Prevention Coalition reinstated as a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization after being revoked in 2022. 

The Missouri Secretary of State revoked the organization’s status on December 28th, 2022 for failure to properly register. Moses says the process to reapply has been a nightmare, but points out that such criteria was not a requirement to obtain funding from the city. She says she has attempted to reapply on three different occasions since November, and bristles at the notion that city council members were at all concerned by this detail. She promises that, regardless of her organization’s non-profit status, the programs under her stewardship will deliver tangible results in 2026. 

“We will cover a lot of ground and do a lot of good,” Moses said. “When I opened Hope Hangout, we reduced the crime rate by 62% (among at-risk youth). What we will do with this program is cut crime by 20-25%.”

Councilmember Darrell Curls says he ended up voting reluctantly for the initiative, but promises to revisit it during 2026, with an eye on how the $2 million is being spent, and what’s happening on the ground. 

“There are still concerns, but I didn’t want to stop the neighborhoods from receiving this funding,” Curls said. “We wanted to get the money out as fast as possible.”