Charlotte Community Outreach

Charlotte Community Outreach

Charlotte, like each of the FBI’s local field offices, has a community outreach program that complements and strengthens our many efforts to protect you, your businesses, and your families in concrete ways through a range of activities and initiatives.

Our recent activities include:

• The Director’s Community Leadership Award (DCLA) was presented to was presented on October 28, 2011, to the Gang Alternative Principles (GAP) program. GAP seeks to prevent and intervene in gang involvement by providing extensive youth programs and educational activities to young men referred by school counselors, principals, juvenile justice officials, and parents. Since the program started in 2008, more than 200 young men have successfully completed the curriculum, which focuses on life skills, leadership development, group counseling and one-on-one tutoring. GAP was the first program in North Carolina to bring various sects of gang members together in a church environment to participate in school and community activities. GAP received local recognition from the Charlotte FBI office in front of a host of friends and supporters. A formal ceremony with FBI Director Robert Mueller was held in Washington, D.C. on Friday, March 16, 2012.

GAP Director Victor Earl, left, and Rev. Ricky A. Woods, center, accepts DCLA from Assistant Special Agent in Charge James Jewell at the First Baptist Church-West Community Services Association’s Touch of Gold Luncheon in Charlotte.

• Twenty participants recently graduated from the Charlotte FBI’s 11th Citizens Academy session. The FBI’s Citizens Academy presents a unique opportunity to strengthen the relationship between the FBI and the community. It brings together a cross-section of community leaders who learn firsthand about our operations and initiatives, which de-mystifies our work and creates new contacts and channels for working together and sharing information.
• Charlotte also hosts Multi-Cultural Advisory Committee (MCAC) meetings. The MCAC was designed to serve as a proactive opportunity to discuss individual and group issues affecting various communities by engaging in open dialogue to promote general communication, awareness and education. The group meets with division executive management on a quarterly basis.

• We recently hosted Community Relations Executive Seminar Training (CREST)—one with the Haitian community and another with the administrative staff of Central Piedmont Community College. A CREST—similar to a Citizens’ Academy but conducted in less time (8-10 hours)—was designed to reach out to a specific community/organization to foster a better understanding with the FBI. The CREST curriculum is customized to meet the needs of the group or organization, which chooses the discussion topic(s).

Among our other ongoing efforts:

• Attending various minority (such as Asian, Indian, Muslim, and Hispanic) community events;
• Partnering with other law enforcement agencies to participate in National Night Out and other community initiatives;
• Meeting with minority groups and civic organizations to talk about what the FBI can do with them and for them and hosting CRESTs and Town Hall meetings as needed to dialogue on key issues;
• Sending special agents and others from the FBI into schools, businesses, and civic meetings to explain emerging crime and security threats and to provide specific advice on how to prevent being victimized by these threats;
• Supporting our Citizens’ Academy graduates, who band together in the North Carolina Citizens’ Academy Alumni chapter to create crime prevention programs and other initiatives that benefit communities;

Taking target practice on Citizens’ Academy range day

• Coordinating drives to bring food, gifts, and toys to the less fortunate during the holidays and other times of the year; and
• Partnering with the American Football Coaches Association and its National Child Identification Program to distribute Child ID kits at football games, zoo events, and other locations.

Visit our national In Your Community website for more information about our overall outreach efforts and our work in other local FBI offices.