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Innovations in Prevention: Piloting Multi-Actor Frameworks in Small and Mid-Sized Cities in the United States

Last updated:

02/12/2025

Publication Date:

13/11/2025

Content Type:

Policy Briefs

Issues:

Multi-Actor Frameworks

In October 2023, the Strong Cities Network, in partnership with Boston Children’s Hospital, the University of Illinois Chicago, and the Prevention Practitioners Network, and with funding support from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security’s targeted violence and terrorism prevention (TVTP) grants programme, launched a two-year project to develop and pilot local multi-actor prevention frameworks in five small-and mid- sized cities across the United States. Among the project’s objectives was to focus attention on the often overlooked and thus unmet needs of cities, particularly small- and mid-sized ones, as they seek to address the complex set of hate- and targeted-violence threats impacting communities around the country. Strong Cities piloted this initiative in collaboration with Albuquerque (New Mexico), Athens (Ohio), Chattanooga (Tennessee), Overland Park (Kansas) and Stamford (Connecticut).

With support and guidance from its project partners and a group of experienced prevention practitioners, Strong Cities worked with each pilot city to develop diverse, multi-actor working groups (Local Leadership Groups) composed of representatives of local government, community-based organisations, law enforcement and others; provided these groups with training on an array of prevention-related topics; and then collaborated on the elaboration and initial implementation of a local prevention framework (LPF) driven by the needs and priorities of local communities.

As a result of these experiences, Strong Cities has produced a set of policy briefs that outline lessons learned and key findings to inform and strengthen future prevention efforts in cities across the United States and beyond. The first in this series was published in July 2024 and the second in August 2025. This is the third, which captures key learnings from the final portion of the project, which concluded in July 2025.

During this third phase, Strong Cities partnered with the Local Leadership Groups in each city to jump-start implementation of the LPFs, convening monthly meetings at which the sub-groups responsible for driving implementation of the different elements of the LPF would brief the wider group on progress and where more attention was needed.

As a result of this work, and consistent with its commitment to inform the prevention efforts of cities in its global network and beyond, Strong Cities has identified a number of lessons and key findings. These are enumerated below. Several of the insights and quotations are taken from participant surveys administered following the conclusion of the project.

1. Prevention Frameworks Need to be Embedded into Existing City Infrastructure

Cities that have made the most progress on prevention efforts view their LPF not as a temporary initiative but as a permanent feature of city governance. Integrating prevention goals into municipal planning documents such as comprehensive or strategic plans, ensures that this work becomes part of the city’s identity and long-term agenda. Cities such as Athens and Stamford have already embedded prevention-related goals into their official planning frameworks. Doing so has created opportunities to align budgets, mobilise interdepartmental partnerships, and reinforce the idea that preventing hate and targeted violence is a shared responsibility across sectors. Participants noted that this type of institutionalisation not only demonstrates the political leadership’s commitment but also signals to residents and community partners that prevention is part of the city’s broader social contract, helping to ensure community safety and well-being.

Many of the stakeholders in the five participating cities agreed that this kind of institutional alignment can help prevention efforts withstand changes in political leadership, turnover among staff in local government offices or community-based organisations, or shifting public priorities. Moreover, project partners emphasised that embedding prevention goals into the city’s strategic vision allows the frameworks to gain legitimacy with the communities they are supposed to benefit, enabling long-term investment and public trust. Creating such durable infrastructure for community resilience ensures that prevention becomes a routine, measurable element of city management. Cities that take this approach not only are better positioned to secure continuity but also elevate prevention to a core municipal function, an integral part of what it means to build and maintain a safe, cohesive and resilient community.

2. Defined Ownership is Needed to Sustain Momentum for City-Led Prevention Initiatives

Related to the above, maintaining momentum for prevention initiatives in each of the five cities as city administrations changed was a challenge. Election cycles often created pauses or uncertainty in implementation, as was the case in Albuquerque, where officials described a ‘paralysis period’ leading up to local elections. In Chattanooga, a promising hate-prevention initiative lost momentum when a new administration took office, forcing the city to rebuild coordination efforts from the ground up. These experiences highlight the importance of identifying and empowering a formal ‘owner’ or ‘convener’ within the city, who is not at risk of being voted out of office, who can steward the prevention process through political transitions and institutional changes. As one Stamford local leadership group member shared, “In order for this work to succeed, there needs to be a local person who has the capacity to own the process”. This type of ownership can come from within the city government or from a trusted community partner. However, it must be clearly defined and resourced, and this often requires local political leadership. Participants also emphasised that assigning ownership of a specific prevention framework goal or workstream helps maintain accountability and ensures that prevention work continues even when other city priorities compete for attention.

Beyond ownership of goals, regular communication among group members and structured meeting schedules for the group were also deemed critical to maintaining engagement. One participant explained, “Communication is key. We need to have regular meetings and keep each other updated on projects and initiatives. The more we band together, the stronger we will be”.

3. ‘Prevention Entrepreneurs’ are Key to Progress

Across the board, participants agreed that LPFs are most likely to have a measurable impact when they empower individuals who take initiative, connect networks and push forward implementation in creative ways. These ‘prevention entrepreneurs’ emerged across the pilot cities. For example, in Stamford, a non-governmental leader in social services took ownership of the community engagement pillar of the framework. Whereas in Chattanooga, a city staff member in the mayor’s office turned targeted violence prevention into half of his official portfolio, developing a Safe Reporting Pathways programme and expanding training for schools and city agencies. These champions embody the power of decentralised leadership within a structured framework, accelerating action when there is a risk that government bureaucracy might not allow space for innovation and thus slow progress.

Cities that cultivate and otherwise support local ‘prevention entrepreneurs’, including through small grants, recognition or access to peer learning models such as the University of New Mexico’s Project ECHO in Albuquerque, strengthen their overall prevention capacity. This helps create a network of motivated actors who can sustain progress beyond an initial project period and ensure that prevention is more than a single time-limited initiative but is a priority carried forward by empowered community members across institutions. These individuals often serve as the bridge between strategy and action, translating high-level frameworks into tangible outcomes. Moreover, investing in them not only accelerates implementation but also fosters civic ownership of prevention goals across sectors.

4. Leverage Existing Networks to Reduce Administrative Burden 

Cities repeatedly emphasised the importance of building upon existing community structures rather than creating new ones from scratch. Leveraging existing trusted partners and ongoing local government and community-facing programmes helped reduce administrative burden while extending the reach of prevention activities. In Overland Park, for example, the youth engagement pillar of the LPF was coordinated through a local anti-hate organisation already running successful youth programmes. Moreover, the city’s community prevention forum – initiated as a result of Overland Park’s engagement with Strong Cities – was hosted by the Jewish Community Relations Council, which offered established networks and facilitation expertise. Similarly, Athens worked with the existing Community Relations Commission, the Athens County Foundation and Ohio University’s Community Engagement Office — each with its own network and established relationships in the communities the city’s prevention efforts sought to reach, to align social cohesion efforts across the city and county.

“There are wonderful resources and partners out there. You just have to go after them,” explained one Chattanooga government official. By connecting prevention work to organisations already leading or otherwise working on related issues, cities avoided duplication and fostered synergy among civic, academic and community sectors. These partnerships can also help sustain activity beyond the initial project cycle, as organisations internalise prevention goals within their own existing mandates. Leveraging these pre-existing networks also reduces the start-up time for implementation and helps ensure that prevention activities are rooted in trusted relationships.

In short, a key lesson for other municipalities is that meaningful collaboration on prevention often starts with identifying existing assets and their strengths, then aligning them around a shared vision focused on addressing shared threats and concerns.

5. Social Cohesion is a Winning Theme for Prevention Messaging

The language used to describe prevention work significantly shapes how it is received and, ultimately, sustained. Particularly after January 2025, several pilot cities found that terms related to ‘diversity, equity and inclusion’ (DEI) were increasingly polarising and risked dividing rather than uniting residents around a shared vision of prevention and thus narrowing community participation in city-wide prevention efforts. Rather than continuing to use the same language, some cities reframed prevention around the broader theme of social cohesion, which helped re-engage residents and partners across the political spectrum. In Stamford, for instance, the annual Diversity Breakfast became the Unity Breakfast, and the city’s Unity Pledge was rewritten to emphasise shared belonging and open dialogue rather than accountability for historic injustices. Athens followed this same approach, embedding concepts of social cohesion and resilience into its Athens 2040 Comprehensive Plan to ensure that prevention goals were well-received by different communities and forward-looking. Participants also agreed that the deliberate reframing created space for a wider range of voices to participate in city-led prevention.

By avoiding potentially divisive language, adopting a unifying frame and emphasising the importance of respecting differences, these cities broadened community buy-in for their prevention efforts, established prevention as a shared civic value and created more durable foundations for long-term cohesion. This experience underscored how focusing on unity can help cities build coalitions with and across communities that transcend political shifts, helping to ensure that prevention remains a collective effort rather than a partisan and potentially divisive issue.

6. Implementing Prevention Frameworks Takes Time and Iteration, but Demonstrating Early Progress, Big or Small, Strengthens Support from Communities

Cities recognised that developing a functional LPF takes time. The local leadership groups spent the first year of the two-year pilot project establishing relationships, understanding community needs, building trust and strengthening competence before they could begin implementing planned activities. This lesson underscores that prevention is a process of relationship and institution-building, not a single project output, and thus requires patience, iteration and consistent reinforcement from city leadership. However, participants found that modest implementation investments early on, such as micro-grants for training, youth summits or peer learning meetings – activities that demonstrate visible community benefits – can help accelerate implementation. Such modest early investments that build towards long-term implementation activities can help ensure that prevention frameworks mature into self-sustaining ecosystems of collaboration that progress at a pace that matches local realities.

In the case of the pilot cities, these investments also supported the evolution of local leadership groups over time, with new participants from behavioural health, education, law enforcement and academia joining as implementation of their LPFs progressed. Ensuring that the composition of these groups – rather than being static – can evolve as necessary to allow for an inclusive approach to oversight and implementation was another key lesson from this pilot. Maintaining this flexibility helps increase the likelihood that prevention frameworks will mature organically and enable both government and non-governmental actors to build the competence, partnerships and trust needed to sustain city-wide support for prevention.

Cities that build in mechanisms for continuous learning and adaptation, such as regular cross-sector touchpoints or exchanges with neighbouring municipalities, are more likely to sustain progress and avoid fatigue among participants. As one Albuquerque official reflected, “If you want something done sustainably, take the time and dedication to build”.

7. Developing Local Prevention Frameworks: Common Methodology – Different Outcomes

Although Strong Cities used a common methodology for developing an LPF in all five pilot cities, the outcomes of the process varied considerably across the pilots – as highlighted below (as of autumn 2025) – very much depending on the particular needs and vulnerabilities of, and assets in, each city. As such, it serves as a helpful reminder of the importance of ensuring that any effort to work with cities to strengthen their prevention ecosystem does not have a pre-determined outcome in mind other than to ensure it responds to the concerns of local communities using approaches most likely to resonate with them.

Resources for Mayors, Other Local Leaders and Cities

For cities interested in getting more involved in hate and targeted violence prevention, Strong Cities has a series of living guides to support mayors, local leaders and city governments. Developed through consultations with mayors and city officials in different contexts globally, the guides draw on experiences, good practices and advice from leaders and city officials around the world and offer a diversity of examples of city-led approaches on prevention and response. Housed in our online Resource Hub, Strong Cities’ guides and policy briefs are crucial resources for in-depth training and support for mayors and city officials globally.

Explore our resources:

• A Guide for Mayors: Key questions, decision points, good practices and lessons learned to help mayors prevent and respond to hate, extremism and polarisation.
• A Guide for Cities: Support for local government officials, practitioners and staff on their roles, and that of local government, in preventing hate, extremism and polarisation.
• A Guide for City-Led Response: Support for mayors and cities in formulating a sensitive and effective response in the wake of a hate- or violent extremism-motivated attack, incident or crisis.
• National-Local Cooperation Toolkit: Support for policymakers and practitioners to strengthen and operationalise cooperation between national and municipal governments to prevent hate and targeted violence, based on local context.
• Navigating Local Impacts of Global Crises: Ten Considerations for Mayors and Cities – Lessons from the Israel-Gaza Crisis: Support for mayors and cities grappling with how to navigate local manifestations of global crises, which can divide communities, accelerate hate incidents and threaten social cohesion.
• Preventing and Responding to Election Disruption and Violence: Ten Considerations for Cities: Support for mayors and cities to safeguard democratic practices and mitigate potential harms during and after election periods.

Contact

For more information on this project or other Strong Cities North America activities, please contact the North America Regional Hub at [email protected]. 

This project was funded by the DHS Center for Prevention Programs and Partnerships, opportunity number DHS-23-TTP-132-00-01. 

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