![]() staff members missed appointments to get fingerprinted by city officials and to provide information for background checks. According to the documents, the agency often failed to file required incident reports outlining its intervention efforts. Unity T.W.O.’s problems continued under the new contracts. was also named the lead intervention subcontractor in the LAPD’s Newton Division, where Valencia was killed. a $250,000 contract to oversee intervention in a troubled pocket of the city bisected by Slauson and Van Ness avenues. Still, last spring, after Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa consolidated gang-prevention programs and boosted funding for gang intervention and prevention, the city gave Unity T.W.O. lied to unpaid workers, claiming that Toberman and the city were withholding funds.Ĭity officials were aware of Unity T.W.O.’s troubles, according to the documents. And according to a letter written by Toberman’s chief financial officer, Unity T.W.O. worked as a Toberman subcontractor, it ran out of money and could not account for its spending. began receiving tax dollars for its efforts - funneled, at the time, through the nonprofit Toberman Neighborhood Center, which was funded by the city’s old and oft-criticized gang-reduction program.ĭocuments show that although Unity T.W.O. neighborhoods.Ībout the same time, Unity T.W.O. helped end a “civil war” between the Swans and the East Coast Crips, two umbrella gangs with membership spanning 21 L.A. The most notable instance occurred in 2004, when Unity T.W.O. was established in 1998 and quickly gained a reputation for fostering “understandings” between rival gangs. Unity T.W.O.’s founder, Kevin Mustafa Fletcher, did not return calls seeking comment he had previously decried the city’s decision as “an injustice.” The mayor’s office has said the decision was “in the best interest of the city” but has declined to elaborate, citing instructions from the city attorney. “There are adjustments that are going to have to be made on both sides.” “There is a higher bar being set,” Lee said. At the same time, she said, intervention agencies have to learn to abide by new rules: ethics standards, dress codes, drug testing. develop the “administrative capacity” to operate like regular contractors. ![]() ![]() City Hall, she said, has failed to help traditional grass-roots groups such as Unity T.W.O. public policy nonprofit, said the troubles underscore the growing pains attending the city’s efforts to overhaul gang-reduction programs. Lee, director of urban peace at the Advancement Project, the L.A. The agency’s slide - from securing inner-city truces to squabbling over red tape - may be a portent of the hurdles ahead. Instead, the mayor’s gang-reduction office is preparing to sever ties with Unity T.W.O. was supposed to be a central part of that effort. Civic leaders are attempting to professionalize the field, which has long operated on the fringe. Gang-intervention workers, many of them former gangsters themselves, act as liaisons between police and the community increasingly, the city relies on them to monitor street gossip and prevent revenge shootings. ![]() The documents paint a portrait of a troubled, overwhelmed agency - of overdrawn bank accounts, blown deadlines and missed payrolls. and City Hall, the agency has left gang-reduction supervisors, city officials and nonprofit executives frustrated with its operation. According to documents obtained by The Times, including financial reports and e-mails between Unity T.W.O. The discrepancy was the latest, and perhaps last, stumble for Unity T.W.O. ![]() never showed up - and yet, days later, it submitted a standard form to City Hall reporting that it had responded as promised and spoken with gang members in an effort to reduce the tension, according to sources close to the city’s gang-reduction efforts. ![]()
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