Rutgers Law, will host an interactive dialogue among community organizers, artists, faith leaders, entrepreneurs, designers, and lawyers on how communities affected by violence conceive of public safety and how our local policies and budgets can reflect community-driven solutions that look beyond policing and incarceration.

Since the protests in Ferguson, MO in 2014, elected officials across the country have committed to reforming policing and the criminal justice system to ensure the safety and security of Black, Brown, and poor communities. These reforms, however, have been threatened by significant shifts a at the federal level, including steps by the Department of Justice to end oversight over police departments and the return of military equipment to local law enforcement. Communities at the grassroots are now coming together to raise the profile of their efforts to transform the way we think of public safety in order to insulate the path to social justice from swaying winds at the top.