This morning, Baltimore Police Department (BPD) Commissioner Michael Harrison unveiled his new crime plan (see the full plan), which includes several OSI-funded initiatives, including a refinement of the Law Enforcement Assisted Diversion (LEAD) program and a move toward community-based micro-policing.
OSI-Baltimore worked with the BPD and the State’s Attorney’s Office to establish the LEAD program, which diverts low-level drug offenders to community-based services rather than the criminal justice system, in Baltimore in 2017. Currently, OSI is working with a handful of Baltimore neighborhoods to explore “what a community-driven micro-community policing strategy can look like,” as OSI Criminal and Juvenile Justice Program director Tara Huffman and Shane Bryan, president of the Ednor Gardens-Lakeside Community Association, wrote in a Sun op-ed in February (“Is community-driven policing the answer to Baltimore’s problems?“).
