Updates

CNA Awarded Nearly $7 Million to Provide Training and Technical Assistance to Law Enforcement

(Released 29 September 2016) Arlington, VA — The U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) awarded CNA three grants totaling nearly $7 million to continue providing training and technical assistance on body-worn cameras, smart policing, and violence reduction to police departments across the country. 

CNA has been providing technical assistance on the use of body-worn cameras to 73 police agencies for the past year. The award announced on Monday, funded under the DOJ Office of Justice Programs’ (OJP) Bureau of Justice Assistance’s (BJA) Fiscal Year 2016 Body-Worn Camera Policy and Implementation Program, extends this assistance to an additional 106 agencies. Through this program, CNA helps law enforcement officials conduct body-worn camera pilot programs, collaboratively develop body-worn camera policies, procure and purchase cameras, determine storage solutions for video files, and collaborate with prosecutors to use the footage. 

CNA also received a 3-year award, administered under BJA, for work on the Smart Policing Initiative (SPI). SPI is a collaborative consortium composed of BJA, CNA, researchers and local law enforcement agencies that are testing solutions to serious crime problems in their jurisdictions. Since 2009 CNA has supported the implementation of research partnerships that rigorously test police innovations and tactics with over 45 agencies throughout the United States. On Monday BJA announced funding awards to 6 new sites. 

CNA received another $3 million award from BJA to provide technical assistance under the Violence Reduction Network (VRN), an initiative which supports and enhances local violence reduction efforts. On Monday at the Fourth Annual VRN Summit in Little Rock, AR, the U.S. Attorney General Loretta Lynch announced the addition of two new cities to the existing network of 13 – Jackson, MS, and Nashville, TN. Since 2013 CNA has supported VRN sites with customized, strategic and intensive training and technical assistance to complement existing antiviolence efforts. 

“CNA has worked extensively with law enforcement agencies on implementing body-worn camera programs, evidence-based violence reduction strategies and community policing initiatives. We are honored to be chosen by DOJ as a key training and technical assistance partner and look forward to helping police agencies solve their most difficult problems through our technical assistance resources,” says Dr. James “Chip” Coldren, managing director of the Justice Group at CNA. 

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CNA is a non-profit research and analysis organization dedicated to developing actionable solutions to complex problems of national importance. With more than 600 scientists, analysts and support staff, CNA takes a real-world approach to gathering data with its one-of-a-kind field program that places analysts on battleships and military bases, in squad rooms and classrooms, and working side-by-side with a wide array of government decisions-makers around the world. In addition to defense-related matters for the U.S. Navy and Marine Corps, CNA’s research portfolio includes policing, homeland security, climate change, water resources, education and air traffic management. www.cna.org