Community Violence Intervention in Action - Annette Anthony

Annette Anthony 0:01

We know a lot of most of the families in this community, because we are from here as well, and we depend on that a lot to be able to do this work, because without the information from the families or the communities, we wouldn't be able to talk to these people and mediate these people, because who who wants to hear someone talking at them that they don't know? We're all from Charlottesville. We all were once going down the wrong path, and now we just feel like we owe it to our communities to do better.

Molly Schnellenberger 0:49

Welcome to solving gun violence. A student led podcast from the University of Virginia's gun violence solutions project, we are dedicated to finding effective strategies to combat one of America's most urgent issues, gun violence. Each of our episodes feature experts sharing actionable solutions to improve public safety while upholding individual rights. My name is Molly K Schnellenberger, and I'm a second year student at the University of Virginia, and your host for today for this episode, I'm being joined by a very special guest, Annette Anthony. Annette Anthony is the dispatcher and Director of Outreach for the Central Virginia violence interrupters, commonly known as cvvi and formerly known as the buck squad. Cvvi is a local community violence intervention program, or CVI, which is a local targeted approach to gun violence prevention that is implemented by groups all over the nation. These range from small cities like Charlottesville to larger urban centers like Baltimore and Chicago, no matter the community, CVI makes a large dent in the number of verbal conflicts that escalate to gun violence.

Molly Schnellenberger 1:59

Miss Anthony. Thank you so much for being here today. Thank you for having me. We are so so excited you're here. So to start us off, could you tell our listeners a bit about what the central Virginia violence interrupters do, and what your role is within that.

Annette Anthony 2:14

Yes, the Central Virginia violence interrupters are formerly known as the buck squad. Started in 2021 there were four murders, and we just felt like we needed to do something. We fight gun violence using mediation, but more importantly, using our relationships to the community and to the streets. The community in Charlottesville is very small, and we are all from Charlottesville, originally from Charlottesville, so we felt like we'll be able to connect with someone from the family of the people in the mediation to come to a common goal.

Molly Schnellenberger 2:57

All right. And then, how do you build these relationships that facilitate your work. How do you identify where help is needed?

Annette Anthony 3:05

So we're all from Charlottesville. We all were once going down the wrong path, and now we just feel like we owe it to our communities to do better. So with the community being so small, I being the dispatcher who answers the phone, takes the information. I'll figure out which person on our team is more closely related to in any way, to the people that they are calling about those people will get a phone call from me, and they will go to whatever designated area it is happening at.

Molly Schnellenberger 3:49

Okay, thank you so much for sharing that. Can you give an example of your work in action?

Annette Anthony 3:55

Yes, I'll use an example. The other day, there was a shooting in a neighborhood that we work. We were called by one of the tenants in the neighborhood to say, there's some gun violence going on there. We got over there. The police had not yet arrived, so I guess we got the call first, and then they got the call, we went over there, and we were able to talk with the people that were still on the scene, both parties, to figure out what happened and why, and since the crime had already been committed, we realized that is now Charlottesville Police Department's job, but our job now is to prevent retaliation. Our job is to get information, who, what, when, where and why, and investigate further.

Molly Schnellenberger 4:55

Yeah, absolutely, so you said that a neighbor called it in and you. Guys actually arrived before the police. Do you guys ever receive pushback from law enforcement, or are they generally grateful for what you do as well?

Annette Anthony 5:08

We receive a lot of pushback from law enforcement. We receive a lot of pushback from news outlets because they feel like if we're getting these calls, then we are given the information on who's committing these crimes, and that we should share that information to the police. However, in our training, we learned that there's a fine line. The police has their job to do it, and we have ours, and if we were to inform them on what's going on, that would stop the trust that we have in the communities.

Molly Schnellenberger 5:50

So you mentioned your training, I want to ask you a little bit more about that. If you don't mind, this is a super dangerous job, and while you guys, like you said, receive training, you don't have the level of support we associate with these other first responders, like police and that sort of thing. So what forms of training does your team receive before entering the field?

Annette Anthony 6:10

We receive training on how to deal with angry participants, how and when to walk away. We receive mediation training. We receive CPR training as well as stop the bleed training. But I must emphasize that we know a lot of most of the families in this community, because we are from here as well, and we depend on that a lot to be able to do this work. Because what without the information from the families or the communities, we wouldn't be able to talk to these people and mediate these people, because who who wants to hear someone talking at them that they don't know. So having that relationship is extremely important.

Molly Schnellenberger 7:07

Yeah, absolutely. Do you think that that lends itself to being a large strength for a program in a smaller city? Do you think that that is something that makes you guys especially successful?

Annette Anthony 7:17

Absolutely, without it, we wouldn't get the information that we do get, because, again, we're trying to prevent the crime. Once the crime happens, we're trying to prevent retaliation. We can't prevent a crime that we don't know has the potential to happen without the information.

Molly Schnellenberger 7:36

Yeah, absolutely, I was going to ask, since gun violence seems so sudden and unexpected to many, and Charlottesville is not a huge city like we've talked about, and you guys cover dozens and dozens of blocks. How do you know where to be to interrupt violence? Is it just solely based on the phone line? Do you guys receive tips in other ways? How do you know where to be?

Annette Anthony 7:59

We receive tips on the phone line. People talk to us, we always say we are participants, always so you know, the people that we're helping are our friends, our neighbors, our family members. So we get information that way, but we are in one part of Charlottesville, which is green stone neighborhood, because we're only able to man one zone. We call the neighborhood zones. Our budget is small, so we are able to be in one zone, but our training teaches us that to produce data, we can only be in one area. Sometimes we'll go, like, for instance, we go to the downtown mall on the weekends because we know that bars are there, that's where everyone is, and a fight can lead to gun violence. So we'll go down there and try to prevent those fights, or get step into those arguments to try to prevent gun violence.

Molly Schnellenberger 9:13

Yeah, and I really want to hone in on something that you mentioned, which is measuring impact. Everybody wants to know about the impact of CVI programs. It's something that's very hard to measure, and it's tough, especially when you're doing preventative work like this. So how do you track it personally? So you can name your accomplishments when you know looking for funding and support

Annette Anthony 9:35

Every week, I being the dispatcher, turn in our numbers, our calls or texts, or, you know, someone stopping us in the neighborhood to give us information. All of that data is collected and turned in weekly. Our calls, the calls turn into investigations. How many of those calls led us to go? Outside and actually investigate. And of those investigations, how many of those ended in an interruption of potential gun violence? And that is printed every week on our website, bucksquad, 911, dot org, and people can see that there.

Molly Schnellenberger 10:17

That's incredible. I didn't know that. Yeah, I want to ask you guys are closer to local firearm violence than almost anyone else. What do you see happening? Trend wise, with gun violence in Charlottesville,

Annette Anthony 10:29

Social media is the biggest reason why I found because these days, if it's not on social media, it doesn't happen. You know, it's not real. And so they post it all on social media, from from the arguments to even the gun sometimes, to their locations. And it's crazy what they'll put up, but they they put it all up.

Molly Schnellenberger 10:55

A lot of the CVI model is built off of street outreach, but we've mentioned a lot about social media being a big influence in gun violence as well. How do you sort of combine the two, or find a balance between the two to inform your work?

Annette Anthony 11:11

It's very difficult. It's very difficult. And actually, we were talking about it this morning on having someone who will solely do social media, because, you know, we're up close and personal. I know you. I know your name. And on social media, there's all these handles that have nothing to do with their name, so I'm having a screenshot pictures with their Instagram names and send it around, like, Who is this? Who is it? It takes so much time, and then they can erase it, and then it wasn't ever there. And it's just extremely difficult piece that we're we're having to deal with more and more, and yet, we actually talked about it this morning, on getting someone, having someone who just monitors social media, because it goes against everything we're taught. So social media does because we're taught our relationships, and we go to the person, and we are looking more long term goals with cvvi. We don't just, okay, you're not going to shoot at them and they're not going to shoot at you. Okay, that's over with. We don't talk to you anymore. Well, we keep in contact with them. We help them get jobs to, you know, start to move in a better, more positive direction. This is six months or more. We're staying in contact with these people, but that's like we're picking them up. We're going to seeing them and and with the social media, sometimes I may not be talking to the owner of of the account. You know, I don't know. Maybe I'm outdated. I don't know what to do about this. It's honestly a struggle.

Molly Schnellenberger 13:05

I find that very interesting. We talk a lot about social media on this podcast. Do you think that that also sometimes makes it easier to find out where people are?

Annette Anthony 13:14

Sometimes, sometimes you have those brazen ones that will actually put their location and go live and show what they're doing and and then you'll have the ones that you never suspected. But it's the relationships I have to push because we're, we're still friends with, with these people, we're still family, and, you know, people talk, and where, that's how we're able to find out the information or what, and shows the small there's but so many places that people go, so we know where they frequent, and we go there.

Molly Schnellenberger 13:54

I wanted to ask, is there anything that the city or the county is doing to support you guys? Are you sort of just on your own right now.

Annette Anthony 14:04

We're on our own. We have gotten funding from the city a couple of times, and we're up for it again, but we're basically on our own, and we survive off of private donations.

Molly Schnellenberger 14:20

That is disappointing. I hope that you guys get more support in the future, because this is really the sort of thing that we ought to be investing in, especially since it's proven to work and work so well. What do you believe that the city of Charlottesville is doing well in terms of gun violence and gun violence prevention? Nothing.

Annette Anthony 14:38

I don't feel they're doing anything well, because I feel like it's too much emphasis being put on lines. UVA line, city line, county line, jurisdictions. When we're a small town, the same people that hang out in the city come up to UVA to the bars. Go to downtown to eat, go on 29 which is the county to shop. And if we're not all in communication, we won't be able to beat this. We won't be able to do anything, because now it's Albemarle County's problem. It's UVA problem. It's the city of charlottesville's problem. And tell us everyone's problem, and everyone communicates, this is what we'll be.

Molly Schnellenberger 15:26

Absolutely I agree with that. What do you think we could do to improve to combat this issue? Maybe give me like, three things you think that the city of Charlottesville, or, you know, the UVA community, could do to support gun violence prevention.

Annette Anthony 15:42

So in when we got into this, our objective was to use mediation to stop gun violence, we found out that a lot of, if not most of the people who were committing these crimes were not just willy nilly outside shooting a gun for no reason, because they have nothing else to do. They're suffering. You know, financially, they have trauma. They have things going on in the household that led them to this, which then started our outreach. We knew that we couldn't just tell them, Don't do that. Do this. We had to show them and take them with us to do it. And I feel like until people, the higher ups, the police, whoever, look at each crime individually and not just the people committing the crimes or criminals, and work with them that way, we'll be where we are, because everyone that still ships from the store isn't a criminal. They may be hungry, but how will you know that if you only lock them up? It's confusing for me. The people that I thought getting into this would would be a fan of this type of work, because I feel like if you believe in that rehabilitation is a real thing, then you have to believe in someone being able to change, and you have to support that change. I'm finding that too many times people just want to lock people away and not deal with it for a time, even though they gonna get out and do the exact same thing, where we're not getting to the problem of it all, we're just satisfied with incarcerating them for however long, and and they go away, and then they come back and they commit a crime, and we'll incarcerate them again, like the recidivism rate is, is extremely high, but I think it's because no one takes the time to look at the person as they take so much time and looking at the crime.

Molly Schnellenberger 18:14

Yes, ma'am, that's very profound. Thank you. I want to backtrack just a little bit here and talk about your team and the qualities that you guys possess. Are there any particular personality traits or backgrounds that maybe you think make a person well suited to do this job?

Annette Anthony 18:34

So when I look at whether a person is suited for this job, first of all, they all have to we're all convicted felons. Most have been incarcerated before, suffered from addiction, some lived experience, to where they will be able to help the people who we're helping in these communities, the people that I hire, I knew from when I was doing wrong, they were doing it right along with me. But that makes me know the impact that their story will have on a teenager or young adult or older adult, on where not to go, because, look where I've been. You have to have some type of lived experience to be on cvvi. You have to have been in the for lack of better word, in crowd when you were out there. Because how else will you get the information.

Molly Schnellenberger 19:42

Yes, ma'am. And I think it's, it's so very admirable how you have taken this unfortunate circumstance and turned it around, and you're saving lives. I think that's really amazing.

Annette Anthony 19:53

I grew up as a child of an addictive parent, and in turn, I was a. Addicted myself. I was a product of the opioid crisis and the over prescribing, and then my dad got clean, and he worked at the Haven homeless shelter for years and at ASG, which helped people with HIV and AIDS. So he always, and then he sponsors people in narcotics, anonymous. So he always was doing that type of work, and it was always around me, and I saw how people that don't understand the lived experience look at those type of people. And that's, you know, what led me to want to do that?

Molly Schnellenberger 20:41

Yeah, I was gonna ask. It sounds like that's been a big influence for you. Yeah, would you say there's any other reasons or particular things that led you to want to do this for your career

Annette Anthony 20:53

That and that so many of my friends have passed away due to gun violence and or drug overdosing, and those people are often overlooked. And I wanted to be one of the ones that didn't just look by them. Look at them.

Molly Schnellenberger 21:14

That's a great answer. Thank you. I want to ask just one more about your team, if you don't mind. Obviously, this is very dangerous. Work is very stressful. Work. How do you guys make sure that you are staying healthy, physically and mentally throughout this process?

Annette Anthony 21:31

So we're very close group, very close. We talk daily and we check on one another. I'm like mother hen on the group. I was the only female for years, so kind of like I'm the girlfriend, I'm the mom, I'm the grandmother, all, I'm the boss, I'm all those things. But also, you know, we we meet up, we go out to eat, we do things like that, just to kind of get our mind over, because it is a mental load. It's never ending. It's not like a nine to five there. There's no day off, there's there's no time off, because gunshots can go at any time. But Rachel, who works with Mom's Demand Action, does yoga, and we do yoga with her weekly.

Molly Schnellenberger 22:31

So yeah, it sounds like you guys really have a tight knit community and a really good family to lean on. I wanted to just ask one more question about community violence intervention programs, just in general, most organizations like this are in larger cities. What do you think other communities like ours can learn from CVVI's efforts?

Annette Anthony 22:58

It has to start in the communities you know, you have to be a part of the community. Doesn't matter the size of the town. You know, gun violence can happen anywhere, but you have to make it a point to be a part of the solution, not a part of the problem. And just letting it be is being a part of the problem. So I say, say something and do something.

Molly Schnellenberger 23:21

Do you think that this is something that could be implemented in a larger city, or do you think that this is specifically successful because it's a smaller community?

Annette Anthony 23:34

I think it can be implemented in larger cities. Like I said, the where they first did this was Chicago. The model that that we trained after what happened in Chicago, and their numbers have dropped drastically in those areas that they work in, though that's what you know, people have to realize in in those areas, because quite naturally. You know, people think you're supposed to stop gun violence in Charlottesville, we couldn't possibly stop gun violence in the whole city of Charlottesville. You know, something that the police department as a whole is not able to do anywhere, but starting in one community and moving to the next, I think it's absolutely possible.

Molly Schnellenberger 24:27

Well, I just have one final question for you. I really enjoyed talking with you today, and I wanted to just ask this question. We ask everybody, what does the solution to the gun violence epidemic look like to you? And you can be as specific or as broad as you want to be.

Annette Anthony 24:43

Well, in Charlottesville specifically, I think it's going to take maybe a team or task force, if you will, to for every jurisdiction to work together to be able to. Communicate who's doing what and and be able to look at why they're doing it like the anchor team. You know, it's a group of mental health therapists police that will get a call, and maybe it's a domestic violence call, maybe the police don't need to come because they're just arguing, right? No one needs to get locked up, because, being honest, the police intimidate people, and they intimidate situations. And it may not be that big of a deal, but once the police are there, people are on edge and defensive, and they have a team that will go to those types of calls or calls about the homeless. We get those as well. They'll go to those types of calls when no one needs to be arrested. The situation doesn't need to be heightened. Let's just see what's going on and see how we can solve the problem until we have more things like that. It's just going to be this. As long as it's looked at as city problem, county problem, UVA problem, and not just the town's problem, it will increase.

Molly Schnellenberger 26:14

That's all the questions we have for you today. We are so, so glad you could join us. It was a pleasure talking to you. Could you let people know where they could find you online and hear more about your work.

Annette Anthony 26:25

You can find us at Central Virginia violence interrupters.com Virginia is just VA or bucks squad, 911, dot com. We have social media pages, we have a website, and we have a 24 hour hotline number that's 434-365-4187.

Molly Schnellenberger 26:45

Thank you so much for sharing that. Everybody be sure to check that out. We will include all of that information in the description, and thank you for listening. We'll see you next time you.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai