In Robeson County, North Carolina—home to some of the state’s highest youth violence rates—community-led prevention efforts were working. Until they weren’t.
In this episode of Shoresides, host Nicolas Magrino speaks with Paul Smokowski, founding executive director of the North Carolina Youth Violence Prevention Center (NC-YVPC), and Leon Burden, lead violence interrupter and founder of the nonprofit Colors of Life. Together, they helped reduce violence in just a few years through a layered, evidence-based approach: school programs, restorative justice, parenting support, and community-based mentoring.
But a sudden federal funding cut in April 2024 brought much of that work to a halt.
Smukowski and Burden share how they built trust and impact in a county long marked by poverty, racial complexity, and criminal justice disparities—and what’s at risk now. This is a story of what real community violence intervention looks like, and what happens when a political shift pulls the plug.
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