A New Approach to Technical Assistance Delivery for Restorative Justice Diversion

This project “A New Approach to Technical Assistance Delivery for Restorative Justice Diversion” will deliver and evaluate a new training and technical assistance strategy for pre-prosecution restorative justice diversion programs focused on youth and young adults. The work will build capacity and readiness among community-based organizations led by people of color, along with local systems partners, to launch restorative justice diversion programs in their own communities. The main objectives are to 1) document and disseminate lessons learned about RJD from an existing group of RJD partners, 2) expand virtual training and technical assistance opportunities for new sites exploring pre-prosecution RJD for youth and young adults, and 3) evaluate the RJD technical assistance delivery method. 

Primary grant activities include exploring the lessons learned from other sites who have implemented RJD; developing a robust online training and technical assistance workshop curriculum; delivering two nine-month online training and technical assistance pilot workshops to eight new partner sites; planning and facilitating two in-person convenings for participating sites; and evaluating this new blended strategy in comparison to a 1:1, in-person approach to RJD TTA.

This grant project will address a precipitous increase in crime and/or type of crime by using pre-prosecution restorative justice diversion to target and reduce felony and/or other high-level types of serious crimes committed by youth and young adults. There is growing evidence that shows this approach is associated with much lower rates of recidivism, provides accountability, and promotes healing among survivors. Awardee's pre-prosecution RJD model also responds to persistent racial injustice in the criminal justice system by prioritizing sites led by people of color and formerly systems-impact people, and tailoring the program design to promote racial equity. 

The project will address the following allowable uses/activities:

-Accelerating justice through the creation of approaches and tools that build the capacity to gather and analyze information to understand key decision points and levers for change (50% of budget). 

-Building alternative strategies and systems such as restorative justice approaches and diversion to enhance better outcomes for those in the criminal justice system (50% of budget)

This award is being closed as an administrative funding adjustment and the award activities will be completed under award 15PBJA-22-AK-04590-MUMU.