[Congressional Bills 119th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[H.R. 4103 Introduced in House (IH)]
<DOC>
119th CONGRESS
1st Session
H. R. 4103
To authorize the Secretary of Health and Human Services to build safer,
thriving communities, and save lives, by investing in effective
community-based violence reduction initiatives, and for other purposes.
_______________________________________________________________________
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
June 24, 2025
Mr. Horsford (for himself, Mr. Thompson of California, Mrs. McBath, Ms.
Kelly of Illinois, Mr. Amo, Ms. Barragan, Mrs. Beatty, Mr. Bell, Mr.
Beyer, Ms. Bonamici, Mr. Boyle of Pennsylvania, Ms. Brown, Ms.
Brownley, Mr. Carbajal, Mr. Carter of Louisiana, Mr. Casar, Mr. Casten,
Ms. Chu, Mr. Cleaver, Mr. Costa, Mr. Davis of Illinois, Ms. Dean of
Pennsylvania, Ms. DeGette, Ms. DelBene, Mrs. Dingell, Mr. Fields, Mr.
Figures, Mrs. Foushee, Mr. Frost, Mr. Garcia of Illinois, Mr. Garcia of
California, Ms. Garcia of Texas, Mr. Goldman of New York, Mr. Ivey, Mr.
Jackson of Illinois, Ms. Jayapal, Mr. Johnson of Georgia, Ms. Kamlager-
Dove, Mr. Kennedy of New York, Mr. Khanna, Mr. Krishnamoorthi, Ms. Lee
of Pennsylvania, Mr. Lieu, Mr. Magaziner, Ms. Matsui, Ms. McClellan,
Ms. McCollum, Mr. Menendez, Mr. Mfume, Ms. Moore of Wisconsin, Mr.
Morelle, Mr. Nadler, Mr. Neal, Mr. Neguse, Mr. Norcross, Ms. Norton,
Ms. Omar, Mr. Panetta, Ms. Plaskett, Mr. Pocan, Mr. Quigley, Mrs.
Ramirez, Ms. Ross, Ms. Salinas, Ms. Scanlon, Ms. Schakowsky, Ms.
Scholten, Ms. Sewell, Ms. Simon, Ms. Strickland, Mrs. Sykes, Mr.
Thanedar, Mr. Thompson of Mississippi, Ms. Titus, Ms. Tlaib, Ms.
Tokuda, Mr. Torres of New York, Mr. Vargas, Mr. Veasey, Ms. Velazquez,
Ms. Williams of Georgia, Mr. Lynch, and Mr. Smith of Washington)
introduced the following bill; which was referred to the Committee on
the Judiciary, and in addition to the Committee on Education and
Workforce, for a period to be subsequently determined by the Speaker,
in each case for consideration of such provisions as fall within the
jurisdiction of the committee concerned
_______________________________________________________________________
A BILL
To authorize the Secretary of Health and Human Services to build safer,
thriving communities, and save lives, by investing in effective
community-based violence reduction initiatives, and for other purposes.
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the
United States of America in Congress assembled,
SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE; TABLE OF CONTENTS.
(a) Short Title.--This Act may be cited as the ``Break the Cycle of
Violence Act''.
(b) Table of Contents.--The table of contents of this Act is as
follows:
Sec. 1. Short title; table of contents.
Sec. 2. Findings.
Sec. 3. Definitions.
TITLE I--DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES
Sec. 101. Community-based violence intervention program grants.
Sec. 102. Office of Community Violence Intervention.
Sec. 103. Community Violence Intervention Advisory Committee.
Sec. 104. Creation of a National Community Violence Response Center.
Sec. 105. Sense of Congress regarding services for victims of violent
crime.
Sec. 106. Authorization of appropriations.
TITLE II--DEPARTMENT OF LABOR
Sec. 201. Improving approaches for communities to thrive (IMPACT)
grants.
SEC. 2. FINDINGS.
Congress finds the following:
(1) Community violence is a significant public health,
public safety, and community infrastructure concern nationwide,
and is a leading cause of death, injury, and trauma for people
in the United States. Community violence also disrupts
employment and hinders a community's social and economic
development. Today, gun violence is the leading cause of death
for America's youth.
(2) From 2010 to 2021, over 233,000 people were murdered in
the United States. Hundreds of thousands more were hospitalized
or treated in emergency departments after surviving life-
changing gunshot injuries and other violent assaults.
(3) In 2020, the Nation suffered the largest single-year
spike in homicides on record, driven largely by record spikes
in fatal shootings. As of 2021, 80 percent of all homicides in
the United States are committed with a gun.
(4) Communities across the Nation experience enormous
disparities in safety that are driven by inequitable social and
structural determinants of health. Interpersonal shootings are
disproportionately concentrated in neighborhoods harmed by past
and present racial discrimination, segregation, redlining,
disinvestment, mass incarceration, and concentrated poverty,
and this violence's toll falls overwhelmingly on people of
color, especially young Black and Brown men and boys and their
loved ones. From 2015 to 2020, Black children and teens were
more than 12 times as likely to be shot to death as their White
peers. Hispanic children and teens and Native American children
and teens were both about 2.6 times as likely to be shot to
death as their White peers. Over this period, 72 percent of
children murdered before their 18th birthday were people of
color, and more than 50 percent were Black.
(5) Black boys and men make up less than 7 percent of the
population in the United States, but account for more than 50
percent of all gun homicide victims each year. Violence is
responsible for nearly half of all deaths among Black boys and
young men, ages 15 through 24, meaning the parents of a Black
son in this age group are as likely to lose their child to
homicide as nearly every other cause of death combined.
(6) This violence imposes enormous human, social, and
economic consequences. Studies show that gun violence has a
national economic cost of $557,000,000,000 annually. The
Director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's
Division of Violence Prevention presented research to Congress
demonstrating that ``youth living in inner cities show a higher
prevalence of post-traumatic stress disorder than soldiers'' in
the Nation's wartime military. While the vast majority of these
young people resiliently persevere, people who have been
victims of violence are at substantially higher risk of being
violently reattacked or killed. Additionally, both direct and
indirect violence exposure have been associated with a host of
poor health outcomes, including chronic illness, anxiety,
depression, and substance misuse.
(7) When properly implemented and consistently funded,
coordinated, community-based strategies that utilize trauma-
responsive care and interrupt cycles of violence can produce
lifesaving and cost-saving results in a short period of time
without contributing to mass incarceration. These strategies
identify those at the highest risk, coordinate individualized
wraparound resources, provide pathways to healing and
stability, and monitor and support long-term success. Many
cities have substantially reduced community violence in recent
years by implementing various combinations of these strategies,
which include the following:
(A) Community outreach programs, which hire
violence intervention and prevention specialists who
have established relationships, relatable lived
experiences, and credibility with individuals in their
communities at high risk of violence and connect them
with intensive counseling, mediation, peer support, and
social services in order to reduce their risk.
Evaluations have found that these programs,
particularly when integrated into wider networks of
supportive services, are frequently associated with
significant reductions in gun violence. A recent study
of the Safe Streets Baltimore looked at data from 2007
to 2022 and found that this strategy was associated
with a statistically significant 23 percent reduction
in nonfatal shootings.
(B) Hospital-based violence intervention programs
(referred to in this section as ``HVIP''), which work
to break cycles of violence by leveraging credible
violence intervention and prevention specialists to
provide intensive counseling, peer support, case
management, mediation, and social services to patients
recovering from gunshot wounds and other violent
injuries. Research has shown that violently injured
patients are at high risk of retaliating with violence
themselves or being revictimized by violence in the
near future. Evaluations of HVIPs have found that
patients who received HVIP services were often less
likely to be convicted of a violent crime and less
likely to be subsequently reinjured by violence than
patients who did not receive HVIP services.
(C) Group violence interventions provide tailored
social services and support to group-involved
individuals at highest risk for involvement in
community violence. This intervention, which must be
trauma-informed, culturally responsive, and community
driven to be most successful, includes a process for
community members to voice a clear demand for the
violence to stop and narrowly focused enforcement
actions against those who continue to engage in acts of
serious violence. The approach coordinates law
enforcement, service providers, and community
engagement efforts to reduce violence in ways that do
not contribute to mass incarceration.
(D) Violence interruption and crisis management,
which respond to potentially violent incidents to
mediate conflicts or to scenes where violence has
occurred to offer trauma-informed services and
community supports to survivors and others exposed to
violence. These strategies help to prevent retaliatory
violence and promote healing and well-being. Programs
that include these components have reported
deescalating dozens of disputes that were highly likely
to end in lethal violence.
(8) Access to job and entrepreneurship training,
apprenticeship, and technological and digital literacy programs
are effective tools in reducing community violence. A 2012
University of Pennsylvania study of 13 high-violence schools in
the Chicago area found ``well-targeted, low-cost employment
policies can make a substantial difference'', and the city's
most violent neighborhoods saw a 43 percent drop in violent-
crime arrests of participants in a youth job program.
(9) Individualized wraparound services and opportunities
include housing support, financial assistance, reentry
services, legal assistance, therapeutic services, grief
counseling or targeted victim services, and skill building
based on the needs of survivors or individuals at the highest
risk of community violence. Leveraging the relationships of
violence intervention and prevention specialists, these
services are used in the context of structured, person-centered
peer mentorship that facilitates personal transformation by
meeting people where they are and offering to help participants
change the trajectories of their lives.
(10) The past year has had a disproportionate impact on
youth unemployment, with 2,900,000 more unemployed youth in
mid-2020 compared with pre-2020 levels. Simultaneously, the
2020 recession accelerated an already increasingly digital and
automated workforce, and youth must attain the digital,
technological, and other technical skills necessary to thrive
in the future of work. While jobs in the customer service and
food industry could fall by 4,300,000 between 2018 and 2030,
health care and science, technology, engineering, and math
occupations could grow more now than ever.
(11) Intentional and sustained investments in community-
based violence reduction strategies can reverse recent
increases in homicides, help to heal impacted communities, and
reduce the enormous human and economic costs of community
violence, without contributing to mass incarceration.
SEC. 3. DEFINITIONS.
In this Act:
(1) Community violence.--The term ``community violence''--
(A) means nonfatal firearm injuries, aggravated
assaults, homicides, and other acts of life-threatening
interpersonal violence committed outside the context of
a familial or romantic relationship; and
(B) does not include acts of violence motivated by
political beliefs.
(2) Eligible unit of local government.--The term ``eligible
unit of local government'' means a municipality or other local
government that--
(A) for not less than 2 out of the 3 calendar years
preceding the date on which an application for a grant
is submitted under section 101--
(i) experienced 35 or more homicides per
year; or
(ii) experienced 20 or more homicides per
year and had a homicide rate that was not less
than double the national average; or
(B) has a compelling need to address community
violence, as determined by the Secretary, based on high
levels of homicide relative to other localities within
the same State.
(3) Opportunity youth.--The term ``opportunity youth''
means individuals who--
(A) have attained 16 years of age but not yet
attained 25 years of age; and
(B) are not--
(i) enrolled in education or training on a
full-time or part-time basis; or
(ii) employed on a full-time or part-time
basis.
TITLE I--DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES
SEC. 101. COMMUNITY-BASED VIOLENCE INTERVENTION PROGRAM GRANTS.
(a) In General.--The Secretary of Health and Human Services (in
this title referred to as the ``Secretary'') shall award grants to
eligible entities to support, enhance, and replicate coordinated
community violence intervention.
(b) Eligibility.--To be eligible to seek a grant under this
section, an entity shall be--
(1) a community-based, nonprofit organization that--
(A) serves the residents served by an eligible unit
of local government; and
(B) has a track record of providing community-
related activities or support program innovation in
communities of color; or
(2) an eligible unit of local government.
(c) Limitation.--Of the amount made available to carry out this
title for a fiscal year, not more than 15 percent of such amount shall
be made available to eligible units of local government.
(d) Use of Funds.--
(1) In general.--A grant awarded under this section shall
be used to implement coordinated community violence
intervention initiatives, through coordinated, community-based
strategies.
(2) Requirements.--A community violence intervention
initiative implemented using grant funds awarded under this
section shall--
(A) be primarily focused on providing culturally
competent, community-based violence intervention
services to the portion of a grantee's community who
are, regardless of age, identified as being at high
risk of being victimized by, or engaging in, community
violence; and
(B) use strategies that--
(i) are evidence-informed and have
demonstrated promise at reducing community
violence without contributing to mass
incarceration;
(ii) utilize trauma-responsive care and
interrupt cycles of violence;
(iii) expand economic opportunity through
new jobs, educational opportunities, or
training programs; and
(iv) are primarily focused on individuals
at high risk of being victimized by, or
engaging in, community violence.
(3) Community partnerships.--
(A) Eligible units of local government.--Each
eligible unit of local government awarded a grant under
this section shall distribute not less than 75 percent
of such grant funds to one or more of the following:
(i) A community-based organization or
nonprofit organization.
(ii) A public agency or department that is
primarily dedicated to the prevention of
violence or to community safety, but is not a
law enforcement agency.
(B) Hospitals.--Each hospital awarded a grant under
this section in the hospital's capacity as a community-
based, nonprofit organization described in subsection
(b)(1) shall distribute not less than 90 percent of
such grant funds to one or more of the following:
(i) A community-based organization or
nonprofit organization that provides direct
services to individuals who have been
victimized by community violence.
(ii) Direct program staff.
(iii) Individual subcontractors who provide
direct program-related services.
(e) Application Requirements.--Each applicant for a grant under
this section shall submit a grant proposal, which shall, at a minimum--
(1) describe how the applicant proposes to use the grant to
implement a coordinated communit