The Alachua County area may lose access to part of a $4 million federal grant after miscommunication and back-and-forth between gun violence prevention partners last week at a meeting of the Community Gun Violence Prevention Alliance. 

The funds were awarded to Cure Violence Global, a national organization that addresses gun violence. The U.S. Department of Justice website says Cure Violence Global (CVG) would administer the grant in Gainesville and Charlottesville, Virginia—with portions of the funds available in both areas.  

The grant had a letter of support from Alachua County and the Children’s Trust of Alachua County, but Gainesville City Manager Cynthia Curry said the city, despite being a focal point for the funds, had been left in the dark until after the money was awarded. 

“We have really been at that table working together; that is no mystery, and it is not a secret,” Curry said of the gun violence prevention work. “So, when you get an organization as large as [CVG] coming in without having touched base with the Alliance or with the city, where the bulk of the work is happening, it’s a little interesting.” 

The Alliance meets monthly to discuss various aspects of gun violence prevention in Alachua County. The group is headed by Alachua County, the city of Gainesville and Santa Fe College and serves to coordinate a response to the issue—declared a public health crisis by Gainesville in 2023. 

CVG sent a letter to Alachua County on Dec. 13 announcing that it would not administer the federal grant. Dr. Monique Williams, CEO of CVG, said the organization had acted in good faith and worked to increase collaboration. She said the decision to step away followed interaction with city officials at a Dec. 11 meeting of the Alliance. 

“Unfortunately, the tone and conduct of city representatives during the meeting were deeply concerning,” Williams said in the email. “Their actions not only mischaracterized our intentions but also created an unnecessarily hostile environment for our national partners, who generously offered their time and expertise.”   

Williams said CVG would leave the local community to continue its work, rather than enter and cause any inadvertent division. 

The decision disappointed many local leaders.  

Marsha Kiner, executive director of the Children’s Trust of Alachua County, said in an email to Alachua County that she was devastated by the news and hoped the project could be salvaged. 

County Commissioner Anna Prizzia forwarded the email from Williams to city commissioners.  

“It is beyond disheartening to receive this email and to have our community to not only lose significant funding for work on Gun Violence, but also to be embarrassed on a national stage for our inability to coordinate and collaborate,” Prizzia said. 

For the past two years, the city of Gainesville and Alachua County have prioritized gun violence prevention. Gainesville was one of 18 communities to participate in One Nation One Project, which provided millions in youth programming to help stem violence. 

Curry attended the Dec. 11 meeting along with other city officials. After a presentation by CVG, Curry said she’s glad the funds will come to Gainesville and aid the community’s efforts.  

“Happy to be a part of this because resources are resources and you all have a grand suite of experience,” Curry said at the meeting. 

However, she said the process worked a little backwards, with Gainesville unaware it was part of the grant application until the Department of Justice awarded the funding. The city should have been involved earlier, she said. 

Williams said it raised no red flags that the city of Gainesville wasn’t involved to date. She said CVG had been told the city wasn’t interested in partnering with the organization. In her email, she noted that the city had been in an earlier meeting with Alachua County and the Children’s Trust, both of whom made motions to work with CVG. 

She also said it’s common to get a grant for an area and only work with the county or city and not the other. The work doesn’t require city participation, she said. 

The federal grant aims to build capacity with local community-based organizations working to build youth and prevent violence. CVG would delegate the funds to these organizations—up to $250,000 for three years.  

Curry said at the meeting that the city felt mischaracterized. She said the city had never refused to work with CVG. Gainesville officials were never approached by the organization about participating or asked for a letter of support from Gainesville. She said Williams had been misinformed. 

“That is what you were told,” Curry said. “You were told something very incorrectly. The city has engaged in this space a 150% from the beginning.” 

Gainesville Pastor Gerard Duncan, who has partnered with CVG and worked to bring the organization to the area, took responsibility. He said CVG asked him to get a letter of support from the city.  

Duncan said he reached out to a staff member, but it came to nothing. He admitted he should have gone straight to Curry on the matter.  

At the meeting, Brittany Coleman, Gainesville’s gun violence intervention program manager, said she hadn’t been approached on the issue.   

Williams said the grant was written for all Alachua County, but a lot of the data came from within Gainesville. That’s why the city is also listed in certain portions.  

Curry points out though that the Department of Justice website said the money is going for Gainesville, not the county.  

In an interview, Curry explained that she entered the Dec. 11 meeting trying to figure out what was expected of the city and what CVG would do through the grant. For CVG to say it had been told Gainesville didn’t want to be involved was shocking, Curry said. 

For two years, Curry said the city has struggled to make progress. Stakeholders worked for a year to form the Alliance and coordinate a response to gun violence. She said that coordination together, not any entity by itself, has helped bring results.  

If CVG intended to work with Alachua County on the grant and decided not to meet with the city, then it should continue and work with Alachua County as planned, Curry said. But even county leaders she met with on a call said they didn’t know about the grant.  

“If CVG pulled out, they pulled out of their own embarrassment that they didn’t do their due diligence,” Curry said. “They didn’t pull out because they felt they were in a hostile environment. They were being asked the same questions that any other manager and staff on the ground working their hearts out around an issue—those questions would have been asked of them in any other community worth their salt, and so that is where I stand on it.” 

County Spokesperson Mark Sexton said County Manager Michele Lieberman reached out to CVG to see if the grant can still be used in the area.  

Sexton said CVG didn’t apply for the grant on behalf of Alachua County but had planned to use the funds in the area. He said the county will continue to support all efforts to address gun violence. 

On Monday, the city of Gainesville and Alachua County held a joint meeting. No one addressed the CVG grant and options moving forward, but gun violence prevention did come up. 

One of the items was a review of the One Nation One Project initiative.  

Alachua County Commissioner Ken Cornell praised the city’s work under the leadership of Curry. He said stakeholders need to continue the level of collaboration that has occurred over the last two years. 

“You all have obviously made this a priority,” Cornell said. 

Mayor Harvey Ward said the city had “thrown the kitchen sink” at the issue of gun violence and pointed to results.  

Gainesville Police Department data, released Monday in a city press release, reports seven gun murders so far in 2024. All of them happened in the first five months of the year, and the city reports decreasing shots fired calls and persons injured by gunfire as 2024 has progressed.  

If the numbers hold, then Gainesville will see a reduction in murders. Gainesville ended 2023 with 14 gun homicides, up from 11 in 2022, 10 in 2021 and eight in 2020. The number of persons injured by gunfire would also decrease from 56 in 2023 to 38 in 2024.  

Editor’s note: The exact funds for how much grant money would be lost were not confirmed.