Mayor Unveils Six-Point Action Plan To Reduce Nashville Youth Violence

Opportunity might be the solution to rising youth violence in Nashville, says Mayor Megan Barry.

“By 2017, I want 10,000 of our youth to have an engaged opportunity that includes a paid internship,” Barry told a group at the Oasis Center on Thursday afternoon.

The internships are one of the action items outlined in a new summit report — the result of five community meetings that began last December. The report was prepared by co-chairs Davidson County Criminal Court Clerk Howard Gentry and Juvenile Court Judge Sheila Calloway.

Goals are grouped into six “priority areas”:

• Training & Employment
• Meaningful Youth Engagement
• Health Awareness & Access
• Restorative Justice & Diversion
• Safe Environment
• Education

Each area comes with a number of recommendations, ranging from vague actions — “use the local arts community when creating engagement opportunities for youth” — to very specific ones: “Develop a second-chance educational program that complements MNPS’s alternative and non-traditional school model and targets students who are at risk of dropping out.”

The underlying theme of the report is that youth violence is primarily a symptom. The bigger issue, the report reads, “has many root causes: among them, joblessness and poverty; poor educational opportunities; a lack of adult role models; barriers to reentry for those who have been incarcerated; and a cycle of trauma and violence.’

Barry says some of these goals could begin to be implemented as soon as next week.