NCCEV Press Releases

For immediate release: February 25, 2002

CD-CP Program Provides Training and Consultation to Sites across South Carolina

MECKLENBURG COUNTY, NC -- The Child Development-Community Policing Program, part of the National Center for Children Exposed to Violence at the Yale University Child Study Center has served children and families exposed to violence and trauma for over a decade. This unique collaboration between law enforcement and mental health professionals seeks to reduce the impact of violence and trauma on children and provide thorough assessment, treatment, and referral for services to children and families in need. The cornerstone of this partnership is a 24 hour a day, 7 days a week acute response service, where clinicians and police partners respond to children and families in crisis.

The CD-CP collaboration that started in New Haven as a partnership between the New Haven Department of Police Service and the Yale Child Study Center has since been replicated in over a dozen communities across the country in urban, suburban and rural settings. As part of the program’s continuing efforts to provide training and consultation to communities across the country, nine sites across the State of South Carolina recently participated in a training to learn how to apply CD-CP principles to their work with children and families. A leading CDCP site, Charlotte, North Carolina, served as host and primary provider of the week long trainings that took place in January and February. Charlotte CD-CP Program Director Sarah Greene and Sgt. Joseph Neely were the lead trainers for the intensive week-long seminars. Dr. Robert Franks and Lt. Stephanie Redding from the National Center in New Haven also provided consultation and training to the South Carolina sites. Sites from across the State of South Carolina including the communities of Aiken, Anderson, Charleston, Columbia, Greenville, Florence, Orangeburg, Spartanburg and Sumter sent law enforcement and county mental health representatives to the training which was held at the Charlotte- Mecklenburg Police Department.

The training was possible because of grant from the U.S. Department of Justice, COPS office that provided funds to the South Carolina Department of Juvenile Justice to help reduce problems with statewide truancy. The truancy initiative was expanded to include a broad view of children and families at risk in their communities and emphasized law enforcement-mental health collaborations as the key to addressing these serious problems. The CD-CP Program, identified as a best practice by the Department of Justice, was called upon to provide training and consultation to the new collaboratives developed as a result of this grant across the State of South Carolina. The National Center for Children Exposed to Violence based at the Yale Child Study Center and the Charlotte CD-CP Program will continue to provide ongoing support and training and technical assistance to the South Carolina sites over the next year.

Dr. Steven Marans, Director of the National Center for Children Exposed to Violence and the CD-CP Program explains, “This is an exciting time for our program. Over the past decade we have seen the CD-CP program grow and expand to a variety of communities and locations across the country.” The South Carolina training is an example of the continued efforts of the National Center and CD-CP program to promote best practices in law enforcement-mental health collaborations in jurisdictions across the country.

For more information, please contact:

National Center for Children Exposed to Violence
1-877- 49-NCCEV
Email: nccev@info.med.yale.edu
Or visit the program’s websites at www.nccev.org and www.cd-cp.org.