Initiatives to reduce crime and violence —including community-focused outreach centers—are having an effect in certain neighborhoods in Central America, though much more work and time are required before anyone can claim victory, according to experts at the Regional Conference on Prevention and Education in Tegucigalpa.

“It is not enough to suppress the crime,” according to the declaration of the Regional Conference on Prevention and Education in Honduras. “It is essential, in the medium and long term, to work toward peace and coexistence in order to prevent violence.”

Environ 350 les élus, décideurs politiques, program implementers and the media attended the Regional Conference on Prevention and Education, organized by the Honduran Ministry of Security of Honduras. La conférence, an initiative of the Honduran Pro-tempore Presidency of the Central American Integration System, drew together national, regional and international experts to share their experiences of what works in crime and violence prevention and discuss how to strategize implementation elsewhere.

At the conclusion of the two-day conference, Honduran President Juan Orlando Hernández told participants: “We are sending a message that we are waking up and are committed as a generation to take on one of the challenges we have faced through history. We will not stay silent and with our arms folded, as has happened in the last 15 ou 20 années, before the issue of safety and prevention.”

De la 350 participants, most of who stayed for both days of the conference, 100 came from outside Honduras, mainly from Central American countries and the Dominican Republic. There were also representatives from the US, South America and other parts of the world.

Creative’s outreach centers play a critical role

In the struggle to ensure safety and prevent violence, Latin America experts at the conference emphasized the need to reach children and youth before they became involved with gangs, as well as the importance of empowering the community to be involved and take action.

Salvador Stadthagen, Directeur de USAID’s Alianza Joven Honduras program, told conference attendees how Outreach Centers were designed to do both.

Au Honduras, 46 Centres de sensibilisation serve more than 28,000 youth and empower communities to engage and protect children and at-risk youth. Au moins 16 new centers will be opening this year. Through education and professional training programs, these Outreach Centers are breaking the cycle of violence for many Honduran communities.

These centers have received a great deal of support, particularly from the Deputy Secretariat of Security for Prevention, and by the local governments of the municipalities in which they are located. The Mayor of Tegucigalpa, Nasry Asfura, has recently committed to building more of them in the Honduran capital.

Dans Le sauveur, Outreach Centers are reaching an estimated 51,045 children and youth, Juan Jose Hernandez, a representative from Creative’s Crime and Violence Prevention Project in El Salvador, said at the conference.

“The centers are places of opportunity and hope in the hearts of communities,” said Hernandez, “and seek the development of children and youth.”

Similar centers have been set up in other countries like Panama to support efforts in violence prevention and provide opportunities for children and youth. The Outreach Centers are funded by the U.S. Agence pour le développement international, gouvernements hôtes, communities and the private sector.

Dans son discours, Stadthagen noted in particular the importance of empowering individuals in at-risk communities with the capacity to foster positive change:

“There are a lot of great people in the most at-risk communities in the region," il a dit. “We need to unleash their potential and look for strategies to engage them to participate and become protagonists of the positive changes those communities require. Developing volunteerism and training volunteers at the community level is one key strategy to achieve this.”

Creative’s Outreach Centers provide opportunities to engage young people and foster volunteerism.

President Hernández publically recognized the importance of Outreach Centers in his closing remarks. He also praised Les jeunes contre la violence, and requested that the other Central American governments support the youth movement in their own countries.

Creative co-sponsors & helps organize the conference

In addition to Hernandez and Stadthagen, other experts from Creative spoke at the conference to share best practices and experience in the field. Creative has been working in communities throughout Central America to develop tools, techniques and practices that engage both policymakers and communities in the prevention and reduction of violence.

Creative also co-sponsored and helped organize the conference. By sharing its network of contacts working in education and prevention activities in the region, Creative helped ensure that the conference was comprehensive and inclusive.

The conference provided the opportunity to share a variety of experiences and lessons learned, deepen alliances and create new alliances between attending organizations. The Conference also allowed Creative’s staff, partenaires, and allies to further their knowledge on Prevention and share their successful approaches.

“Creative has a very solid Education practice. Joining our experience in prevention and citizen security with our experience in education issues such as [école] drop-out, an important risk factor for violence for example, is important for developing more effective prevention programs,»Explique Stadhagen. “The fact that this Conference explored the nexus of prevention and education was a great opportunity.”

Guillermo Céspedes, former Deputy Mayor of Los Angeles and currently the Deputy of the Proposer plus programme, spoke about Creative’s secondary prevention project in Honduras.

Financé par l'USAID, Proponte Más will identify and work with 800 families and 8 à 17 year olds who are empirically at the highest risk of joining gangs. It is based on a successful pilote de 100 families in the Honduran capital.

During a separate panel session, Fabian Bendersky, a clinical psychologist from Argentina and Creative consultant, discussed the large and untapped potential of sports for prevention and reduction of violence among youth.

Soccer programs Bendersky has organized in El Salvdor have proved effective in teaching empathy, developing self-discipline, improving critical and reflecting thinking, increasing self-confidence, decreasing violence and absenteeism and improving young peoples’ ability to meet the challenges of daily life.

Thirteen Outreach Centers catering to at-risk youth will receive $83,000 from the Tegucigalpa, Honduras, gouvernement, le USAID-Honduras Youth Alliance program announced.

The funding will support the Outreach Centers through the 2016 year by enabling repairs and improvements to the buildings, supporting expanded operations and services and increased volunteers, as well as assisting with the implementation of Microsoft Academies.

The agreement was signed by Nasry Asfura, Mayor of Tegucigalpa, and Salvador Stadthagen, Directeur deUSAID-Honduras Youth Alliance, and represents a first step for deeper and longer-term support from the municipal government for Outreach Centers’ violence prevention activities in the city.

“The current Tegucigalpa municipal government has made a remarkable improvement to the infrastructure of the capital of Honduras, and also now wants to concentrate efforts in the social development of the city’s most vulnerable neighborhoods," dit Stadthagen.

With the support of the U.S. Agence pour le développement international, Alianza Joven Honduras uses grants and technical assistance to enable the government, private sector and affected communities to address violence and reform the justice system. Alianza Joven Honduras focuses on six cities— San Pedro Sula, Choloma, Ceiba, Corps, Puerto Lempira and Tegucigalpa—that are experiencing the most violence. Il est mis en œuvre par Creative Associates International.

Violence remains a serious issue in Tegucigalpa, where homicide rate in 2015 était 73.3 par 100,000 personnes. The World Health Organization considers 10 par 100,000 an epidemic.

Tegucigalpa’s Centres de sensibilisation are designed prevent violence by providing support and opportunities to vulnerable youth in the city’s most at-risk communities. Each Outreach Center benefits an average of 300 children and youth and guides them in their transition towards adulthood.

The network of Outreach Centers in the capital is doubling in size this year, as a seventh new building has been developed with support from Price Philanthropies Foundation, a foundation associated with PriceSmart, un U.S.. wholesaler with a strong presence in Honduras. Six of the 13 Outreach Centers are currently in development, joining the seven currently operating in the city. Le secteur privé has been an active supporter of the Outreach Centers.

The support provided through the agreement with the Tegucigalpa municipal government, which will be disbursed in two parts in July and October, makes possible the implementation of Microsoft Academies in three of the new Outreach Centers.

These Microsoft Academies and the Outreach Centers themselves give children and youth opportunities for creative uses of free time, as well as academic and career support.

In addition to helping establish Outreach Centers, other programs in the country are focusing on preventing crime and violence, y compris Proponente Mas et Les jeunes contre la violence.

The USAID-Honduran Youth Alliance, has developed valuable and close partnerships for the prevention of violence with the Municipalities of San Pedro Sula, Ceiba, Choloma, Tela and La Lima.

Although the USAID-Honduran Youth Alliance had worked with the Municipality of the Central District in one Outreach Center (Nueva Capital), this is the first comprehensive agreement covering the whole of the Outreach Center network in the capital.