Mid-Atlantic Gang Reduction Overview                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                               December 21, 2005   Problem Assessment:   Most gangs are not 'nationally' affiliated. Most small neighborhood groups are  consisting of 6-10 youth, however, some groups are historic and very entrenched, as they have a generational link to fathers and uncles who have sifted them in. These LARGE city-wide groups have multiple neighborhood teams; typically composed of one main leadership team that is linked to other multiple sites, in which to distribute out of. As they usually buy in quantity, they will hold and dominate an area, for life.  Along with this norm is included the desire to move up and move out to connect with larger and more substantial teams. They perceive that this gives them clout and respect. There are National teams who are looking for these kind of groups, to include them, as part of their national drug distribution network. Many of these same national teams are being prospected by the international teams.  The U.S. Gov. has been exceedingly successful in arresting the South American heads of cartels. Through these arrests, in essence, we have seen these home grown International giant Cartels, be decapitated, and they have been broken up into more regional cartel-ets. As many no longer have a continuum of organization, that situation has given an opportunity for the Russian Mafia to move in.  Where the Communist invasion couldn't work, capitalism, works fine.  The Russian Mafia is running the Mexican Mafia, right over our porous boarders. With the NAFTA Treaty, they now are able to drive drug laden tractor trucks over the boarder, of which only a small percentage are intercepted.  Much of this is written off as expectable losses by these teams.   Many state-wide, and even regional legs, of national gangs, have been noticeably increasing lately.  It seems to be all about the money to these gangsters, and America is a big target with lots of possible holes.  Our nation’s home security is focused on the fact that gangs represent a possible courier of dirty bombs, as they are so well linked and selfish enough, not to care about society at large.    We need the community, in partnership, to address the needs of youth so they don't burn down their own community because they have no grid to measure what they are doing, and a limited vision for options. Civic league partnerships with weed and seed programs haven’t been able to fill the gaps between federal task forces, and local police units.  State Attorney General’s offices and the Sec. of Public Safety have been focusing on this situation, and the need for Freedom Core kind of activities has been increasingly evident.     In order to address this situation, the GXG training teams recently spoke at the DJJ Faith-Based Conference in D.C this past May. In addition, we invited Bob Florez (DJJ) to come and speak at our Virginia State Gang Reduction Conference that we had set up to address this situation.    We wanted to provide a Model that could quickly be reproduced nationally, so that trainers could produce more trainers, in order to multiply the feet on the ground and the eyes in the neighborhoods; where we, together, wake up the youth to join us in reducing gang recruitment.     Virginia Answers America’s call:   September 10, 2005, God’s X Gangsters, along with Co-Host, Norfolk State University, unfolded a much needed prevention training Program.  We joined with Regional stake holders who gathered in a Virginia Gang Reduction Conference to focus on brainstorming together to find reachable, doable solutions to Reduce Gang Involvement while keeping our Youth Alive, Reduce Crime, Increase the Value of our Communities, Ensure the Continuance of a World Class Education System, Promote Healthy Lives, and Strengthen the Families of our region of America.    It was our set task to cross all set perceived geographical and personal borders, as we linked hands, to move quickly into finding what was working and also producing visible prevention and intervention success stories. Previous to this conference, we had been gathering routinely to see what we could do in neighborhood networks. During these local meetings, we had realized that there was a need to gather with a larger spectrum of experts to see an over view of what was available, and then link to address this issue in a more seamless manner.   We invited them to give us insights on addressing ways and means to fill the still-existing gaps in service.  We didn’t have time to reinvent from the ground up, so we encouraged the speakers to focus on how we could quickly link and lock arms as we come to fill in as part of the complete answer. Our speakers represented successful Prevention and Intervention Programs, from various backgrounds and with separate informational resources. We invited Federal, State and City Gang experts, Police Gang Task Force members,  Juvenile Detention Directors, and Faith Based partners for a real grass roots turn-out.  As the day unfolded, most of the speakers and participants grew to realize that we really needed each other.  We all had a passion and were capable of being part of the components of a long term Gang Reduction Network. At the core of this, is the servant team of God’s X Gangsters’ training components and Norfolk State University School of Social Work for evaluation and program excellence.   This document(s) contains contain information that is privileged, confidential, and/or otherwise exempt from disclosure under applicable law.  Any disclosure, dissemination, distribution, copying, or other use of this communication or its substance is prohibited without specific written permission.   Please send your request to bemery10@cox.net