Travis County District Attorney Supports City Initiatives to Improve Public Safety
Travis County, Tx — This week, Travis County District Attorney José Garza delivered letters to Austin Mayor Watson and City Councilmembers to express support for continuing funding of public safety initiatives included in the City’s proposed 2023 – 2024 budget. This includes their initiatives that continue to invest in community-based gun violence prevention programs, resources for victims of crime, and efforts to address hate crimes and incidents to keep our community safe.
Providing additional investments in the community-based gun violence prevention initiative, ATX-Peace is crucial to the growing gun-violence prevention ecosystem in Austin and Travis County. The program collaborates with Jail to Jobs and Life Anew to develop community-based violence intervention (CVI) strategies. CVI strategies have proven to reduce gun violence and improve public safety when properly resourced.
Our office also supports continuing the funding for seven Victim Services Counselors in the Austin Police Department to support our joint efforts that meet the needs of victims of crime in our community. The Travis County District Attorney’s Office and Austin Police Department are pursuing several joint initiatives to improve our justice system response to criminal cases involving complex interpersonal dynamics such as family violence crimes and sexual assault. When we meet the complex needs of victims of crime, we increase the likelihood that they will participate in the prosecution of their abuser.
Finally, our office supports the city’s initiatives to address hate crimes and incidents in our community. Through our participation in the Hate Crimes Task Force and other collaborations, our office and APD have a successful partnership investigating and prosecuting hate crimes in our community. This includes Improving our ability to collect data about trends in hate incidents in our community, which is an essential part of our joint efforts to keep our community safe.
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