News and Editorials

San Jose City Commends SVCCJ Youth Programs
May 1, 2007

On May 1, 2007, the San Jose City Council honored SVCCJ for its many youth programs. Here is the listing from the City Council Agenda:

"Presentation of a commendation to the Silicon Valley Conference for Community and Justice for the extraordinary work they do with youth to promote peace and prevent hate. (Mayor)"

SVCCJ serves all ages of youth of San Jose in several notable ways, including all our youth/education/leadership programs from Growing Circle through MLK Student Contest, Holocaust Studies, Camp Everytown and Leadership Today.

What you may not realize is that we also serve a huge number of young people in our Victim Witness program, where child abuse is heavily represented as one of the key crime areas for compensation.

Other points of history (from the period when SVCCJ was founded as the Silicon Valley regional office of NCCJ):

1. We pioneered our camp programs with the "Homeward Bound" program for almost a decade in the Sheriff's Ranches with incarcerated youth.
2. We founded and operated the "Court Appointed Special Advocates" for children swept up into the justice system, before spinning it off as a separate agency.
3. We founded and operated the "Child Abuse Special Interview Center" for many years before spinning that off too.

Sometimes people ask why SVCCJ includes such seemingly different services as the Victim Witness Assistance Center and all our Youth and Interfaith programs. The reality is that one of the primary areas of racial, ethnic, cultural friction in our society is the justice system; and it's fair to say that minorities are more heavily represented in the crime statistics as victims, as are the impoverished. Tackling those points of friction enables the community and the justice system to work together to prevent racial/ethnic conflict - a major reason why and how SVCCJ really does help San Jose and Silicon Valley avoid the riots that occur elsewhere!

But the other reason should be obvious from the fact that our youth programs have a long history of productive ties linking educational venues and the justice system as well. Training police for community policing and gang prevention through their part in our Everytown and Common Ground programs, while doing the prevention on the youth side for our schools, are just a couple of the obvious tie-ins.

Just thought you'd like to know....

Bart Charlow