Title: Principles and Promises: BJA's Plan for the Future
Series: Brochure
Author: Bureau of Justice Assistance
Published: October 2002
Subject: criminal justice -- general
19 pages
40,960 bytes

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Principles and Promises: BJA's Plan for the Future

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Contents

Foreword

Guiding Principles

Principles and Promises

o Local Control and Limited Government
o Simplifying the Process
o Accountability for Results
o Providing Assistance
o Increasing Communication
o Working Together To Provide Leadership

Policy Initiatives

o Community Planning
o Crime Prevention
o Counter-Terrorism
o Law Enforcement
o Adjudication
o Community and Institutional Corrections

o Information Technology
o Faith-Based Initiatives

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Foreword

The Office of Justice Programs (OJP) was created to help America's state and
local governments improve the criminal justice system and to restore security to
our neighborhoods, workplaces, and schools. As part of that effort, the Bureau
of Justice Assistance (BJA) provides funding, training, and technical assistance
to states, local governments, and other justice and prevention agencies. 

For nearly 20 years, state and local visionaries have worked with OJP and BJA
to create forward-thinking solutions to difficult crime problems. Reviewing these
successes, I am reminded that the best and most exciting ideas are born not in
Washington, D.C., but in our states, our territories, and our communities. 

It is with this experience in mind that we set out the principles that will guide
BJA in the coming years. These principles will help us design our policies,
administer our funding sources, and oversee our programs. No principle will be
more important to us than providing for state and local control. President
George W. Bush set out this principle well when he said that his vision is an
"active but limited government: one that empowers states, cities, and citizens to
make decisions." 

This plan is a good beginning, but it is not a measure of success. What matters
is not making promises, but making good on promises. To make sure that you
are able to hold us accountable, BJA will publish an annual report that outlines
our progress.

I look forward to the challenges ahead. The history of our nation tells us that
nothing worth achieving comes easy. Every agency within OJP, including BJA,
is committed to making difficult changes, knowing that if we remove
unnecessary, burdensome federal restrictions, those at the forefront of the fight
against crime can focus on what matters most. 

Richard R. Nedelkoff
Director

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Guiding Principles


President George W. Bush

The President has clearly set out his vision that the United States should have an
"active but limited government: one that empowers states, cities, and citizens to
make decisions; ensures results through accountability; and promotes innovation
through competition." 

o Citizen centered, not bureaucracy centered.
o Results oriented, not process oriented.
o Market based, actively promoting innovation and competition.

"We ought to care less about rules and regulations and more about how we're
helping people help themselves." 

--President George W. Bush

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U.S. Department of Justice

The U.S. Department of Justice Strategic Plan includes three objectives for the
Bureau of Justice Assistance: 

o Improve the crime fighting and criminal justice system capabilities of state,
tribal, and local governments.
o Break the cycle of substance abuse and crime through testing, treatment, and
sanctions.
o Support innovative, community-based programs aimed at reducing crime and
violence in our communities.

Office of Justice Programs

The Office of Justice Programs, U.S. Department of Justice, has established the
following objectives in its core mission of supporting state and local criminal
justice systems:

o Provide federal leadership in developing the nation's capacity to prevent and
control crime, administer justice, and assist crime victims. 
o Identify and promote understanding of critical crime, delinquency, and justice
issues.
o Develop, support, and evaluate promising and innovative strategies for
ensuring safe and just communities and assisting victims of crime.

o Build partnerships that strengthen the capacities of communities and federal,
state, and local governments.
o Ensure a fair workplace that maximizes each employee's contribution to the
overall mission and goals of OJP.

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Principles and Promises

"To reform government, we must rethink government."

--President George W. Bush

At the Bureau of Justice Assistance (BJA), we are committed to principles that
guide our decisions and influence the way we work. Based on these principles,
we have created a plan for BJA's future that we hope will help us better serve
our partners in the field. Over the next few years, BJA will work to fulfill the
promises that follow, and we will update you on our progress on our web site
and in our annual reports.

Local Control and Limited Government

States and communities know best what they need. The Federal Government
should be a help--not a hindrance--to the people we serve. Our goal must be
to work to eliminate any unnecessary rules that limit the power of our states and
communities to find the solutions that work best for them. This principle will
guide every decision we make.

o BJA will examine its guidance and policies and eliminate any requirements
that go beyond our programs' governing statutes or any requirements that are
not needed to ensure fiscal responsibility and measure results.

o BJA will help its grantees find ways to meet their needs by providing clear
and unrestrictive guidance about the purpose areas for each of our funding
sources. 

o BJA will work to add more flexibility to how grant funds can be spent by
reexamining the purpose areas for each of our funding sources and making
recommendations to Congress.

Simplifying the Process

The people who work to make our communities safer have enormous
responsibilities. Every moment they spend completing unnecessary paperwork
or maneuvering through bureaucratic obstacles is time taken away from what is
truly important. BJA will look at every existing rule and requirement and
eliminate what is not needed. We will also provide our grantees with tools to
make their jobs easier.

o BJA will examine its reporting requirements to ensure that they serve
necessary purposes and to find solutions that will make reporting simpler.

o BJA will assess its application and reporting systems and develop solutions
that minimize paperwork and improve our ability to use the information we
receive. 

o BJA will create and publish a simple guide to grant management to make sure
our requirements are easy to understand.

o BJA will work to streamline its payment programs to make applying for and
receiving funds as simple and burden-free as possible.

Accountability for Results

The effectiveness of our grant programs should be based on results--not on
how well grantees complete paperwork. Too often, funding agencies focus
more on ensuring that rules are met and forms completed and less on what
impact their grantees make. At BJA, we will work to make sure that the
information we ask grantees for helps to better measure the impact of their
efforts, while imposing fewer and less burdensome reporting requirements.

o BJA will reassess each reporting requirement and streamline it so that our
grantees answer fewer, but more useful, questions.

o BJA will redesign our grant monitoring system so that we are better able to
provide feedback that focuses on helping grantees and sharing their successes
with others. 

o BJA will establish a system of desk monitoring that allows us to reach more
grantees, while focusing our site visits on providing technical assistance and
learning about our grantees' successes.

o BJA will work to establish information sharing or joint monitoring agreements
with other offices and bureaus in the Office of Justice Programs (OJP) that
share the same grantees. 

Providing Assistance

One of our roles as a funding agency is to provide support and assistance to
our grantees. With limited technical assistance dollars, we are committed to
planning strategically to ensure that we provide the assistance our partners want
and need. 

o BJA will develop an annual training plan that presents a tentative schedule of
training sessions nationwide and describes the training tools we will provide to
our grant recipients and state administrative agencies. Our goal is to help
grantees plan for their own needs and maximize their training dollars. 

o BJA will collaborate with states and communities to establish training and
technical assistance partnerships in ways that save everyone development time
and money. 

o BJA will develop a technical assistance program that allows BJA to be
responsive to urgent and emerging needs of local, state, and tribal governments
and the justice community as a whole.

o BJA will provide the most current and easy-to-understand training and
technical assistance possible to our grantees. We will develop a variety of
training tools for our grantees, including distance learning, PC tutorials, CD-
ROMs, DVDs, videotapes, streaming video, and teleconferencing. 

o BJA will host regional and national training conferences for state administering
agencies and grant recipients. Specific training will include both programmatic
and financial aspects of OJP's grant programs.

Increasing Communication

All of the plans that we have for BJA rely on our ability to communicate
information. To make sure that we can inform our grantees and constituents
about changes that will help them do their jobs better, we must be diligent in
communicating well and often. And we must be available when our grantees
and constituents seek to communicate with us.

o BJA will e-mail our grantees regularly to keep them up to date on new
initiatives, meetings, and technical assistance tools.

o BJA will continue to redesign its web site to ensure that it is user friendly to all
of our audiences, provides up-to-date information on activities and priorities,
and links our constituents to other sources of information they need.


o BJA will communicate often--through e-mails, the BJA web site, and BJA's
annual report--about our progress toward our promises.

Working Together To Provide Leadership

We know that the best solutions to criminal justice problems come from the
field. Our role is to provide national leadership in criminal justice issues by
looking for innovative solutions and promoting them throughout the country. In
doing so, we help states and communities learn about the successes and
promising practices that others have worked to produce.

o BJA will host a series of meetings with our state administrative agencies and
with other grantees and partners to discuss the issues that are important to
them, including ways in which BJA can be a more responsive partner.

o BJA will establish policy offices that work to find and encourage innovative
ideas. These offices will be resources for the field, and they will maintain a
library of state-of-the-art criminal justice information on the BJA web site.

o If funding is available, BJA will set aside funds for important focus areas and
use those funds to encourage our grantees to develop innovative demonstration
projects.

o BJA will sponsor national and regional meetings to discuss important policy
issues. At these meetings, we will explore ways to bring new ideas to the
criminal justice community and help our grantees find the resources to carry
them out.

o BJA will develop topic-specific fact sheets and other publications on
important topics, and we will make them available on the BJA web site. 

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Policy Initiatives 

"We must make it a priority to ensure that leaders at every level of government
have the information they need to protect our communities." 

--Deborah J. Daniels, Assistant Attorney General, Office of Justice Programs

BJA is committed to many initiatives that we hope will bring positive changes
and help each of our partners in the field. As we expand upon these initiatives
and identify new ones, we will provide updates on our web site and through our
annual report.

Community Planning

At BJA, we firmly believe that the best decisions are those made closest to the
people. States and communities know what they need and have a unique
perspective on how to solve problems. It is the people on the front lines who
make lasting change. But every state and every community works with limited
resources. It is crucial that we focus those resources to produce results. 

Communities big and small can achieve their goals by planning for their futures.
We believe that every community should have access to the tools it needs to
identify its most urgent problems and choose the best ways to deal with them.

o BJA will work with OJP to develop tools and assistance to help states and
communities conduct strategic planning. 

o BJA will work with OJP to create a web-based community planning guide
that includes tools communities can use to find and analyze important planning
data.

o BJA will identify and share the lessons learned by communities that have
made positive changes from their local planning efforts.

Crime Prevention

The actions of community members are extremely important to preventing
crime, and law enforcement agencies can offer the help community members
need to make a difference. Preventing crime involves not only making sure that
our houses are secure and that we take precautions to be safe, it also means
working with law enforcement to look out for the safety of our neighbors and
other community members. 

We believe that decreasing crime and making our communities safer requires a
return to the value that we must all take responsibility for our families and our
neighborhoods. BJA is committed to providing communities with the tools,
information, and resources they need to join together, learn what to do, and
take action. 

o BJA will promote community involvement and volunteerism through the
President's Citizen Corps initiative.

o Under Project ChildSafe, a component of Project Safe Neighborhoods, BJA
will work to meet President Bush's goal of providing free gunlocks and gun
safety information through state and local law enforcement agencies nationwide.

o BJA will seek out public and private partners to plan, develop, and
disseminate public awareness strategies that focus people's attention on crime
prevention and creating change in their communities.

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"...A teenager is more likely to die from a gunshot than from all natural causes of
death combined. This is unacceptable in America. For our children's sake, this
nation must reclaim our neighborhoods and streets." 

--President George W. Bush

Project ChildSafe

For our children's sake, it is crucial that gun owners know how to store and
handle their weapons responsibly and that they make sure their weapons can
never cause deadly accidents.

Project ChildSafe will provide $50 million in the first year alone to distribute
gun locks and gun safety materials throughout the United States. Through a
national nonprofit organization, new locks that meet federal safety standards will
be purchased and distributed equitably to all states and territories. Although
Project ChildSafe is a national program, each state or territory's leadership will
decide how to distribute locks in their communities.

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Counter-Terrorism

The events of September 11, 2001 changed our nation. On that day, fighting
terrorism became the responsibility of every American. BJA recognizes that it is
the job of law enforcement agencies and prosecutors to bring terrorists to
justice, but we also believe that every citizen can play a vital part in helping to
prevent terrorism. Our role is to facilitate the ability of citizens, whenever
possible and appropriate, to participate in terrorism prevention and
preparedness efforts. 

Like America's citizens, our nation's law enforcement officers face new
challenges to responding effectively to terrorism. To meet these challenges, law
enforcement officers must have the training and resources they need to prevent
future tragedies. Local and state governments must find new ways to quickly
disseminate threat information and rally first responders in the event of an
attack. They must also learn new ways to work with the community to gather
and assess information about potential terrorist operations and to integrate
counter-terrorism measures into their daily operations. BJA is committed to
working with all levels of government to help prevent, disrupt, and defeat
terrorist acts before they occur. 

o BJA will continue to support the State and Local Anti-Terrorism Training
program, an initiative that teaches law enforcement about counter-terrorism
measures that work at the community level.

o Working with the Office for Domestic Preparedness, the Federal Bureau of
Investigation, the Federal Emergency Management Agency, the Office of
Homeland Security, the Federal Law Enforcement Training Center, the Office
of Community Oriented Policing Services, the National Institute of Justice, and
the Executive Office for United States Attorneys, BJA is coordinating
counter-terrorism training efforts nationwide so that we avoid duplication, meet
emerging needs, and ensure that our nation's first responders to terrorism
receive consistent and appropriate information. To learn more about this
initiative, visit www.counterterrorismtraining.gov.

o In coordination with a national nonprofit educational organization, BJA has
published and will continue to promote the Citizen's Preparedness Guide. This
guide, available at www.citizencorps.gov, teaches citizens how to prevent and 
prepare for terrorist acts and other emergencies.

o Because of the tragedy of September 11, it is more important than ever that
state and local governments communicate with law enforcement and first
responders quickly. To help meet this challenge, BJA will work with the
Regional Information Sharing Systems centers to provide secure
communications networks for state and local governments and offices charged
with homeland security.

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Citizen Corps

Citizen Corps is a broad network of volunteer initiatives that organizes the
efforts of Americans who want to prepare their neighborhoods and
communities to prevent and respond to terrorism, crime, or any kind of
disaster. Citizen Corps is a component of the President's Freedom Corps
initiative. For more information, visit www.citizencorps.gov.

Citizen Corps initiatives include--

o The Citizens' Preparedness Guide, which describes crime and disaster
preparedness techniques and provides the latest information on being prepared
for terrorist attacks.

o The Neighborhood Watch initiative, which is working to double the number
of neighborhood watch groups in the United States.

o The Volunteers in Police Service program, which recruits and trains
volunteers to aid law enforcement agencies in both furthering crime prevention
and freeing officers to spend more time on prevention and enforcement.

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Law Enforcement

Law enforcement officers are our country's front line in the fight against crime,
and they perform a difficult and dangerous job with skill and dedication. But the
nation's law enforcement officers constantly face extraordinary new challenges
with limited resources. 

At BJA, we respect the choice of law enforcement officers to dedicate
themselves to serving their communities. We believe that we must honor their
service by doing everything possible to provide them with the support,
resources, and training they need to meet the needs of their communities. It is
critical that we help law enforcement officers spend their time as effectively as
possible by increasing their technological capabilities, and we must redouble our
efforts to help law enforcement agencies work with communities to prevent
crime and build support for their enforcement activities. 

o BJA will sponsor training for BJA-funded multijurisdictional task forces
across the country. This training will teach task forces how to augment their
current duties with terrorism prevention and enforcement. 

o BJA will work with national law enforcement associations to provide
research, training, and technical assistance programs to law enforcement
officers nationwide. 

o BJA will help law enforcement agencies get the safety equipment they need to
protect their officers' lives through the Bulletproof Vest Partnership Program.


o BJA will encourage the use of federal funds for cutting-edge training
programs for law enforcement officers.

o BJA will fund programs that enhance the investigative capabilities of forensic
science laboratories.

o BJA will support initiatives for rural law enforcement entities.

"The goal is to weave an impenetrable nationwide network of law enforcement
agencies, all working together in pursuit of one common goal--to put criminals
who use guns behind bars." 

--Attorney General John Ashcroft on Project Safe Neighborhoods

Adjudication

Prosecutors, judges, and court personnel are looking for new approaches to
adjudicating offenders that will not only clear cases and decrease dockets, but
also lower recidivism. Throughout the country, courts are recognizing that
crimes involving gun violence, mentally ill and disabled offenders, and drug
users require a special effort to ensure that these offenders are held
accountable, but returned to the community with the services and supervision
they need to stop offending. 

Additionally, state and local prosecutors, defense attorneys, and judges face the
challenge of meeting increasing needs with limited resources. While local court
personnel will decide how to meet those needs, BJA is committed to providing
resources, tools, and support to help them test their ideas. 

o BJA will support community justice concepts through technical assistance and
training.

o BJA will fund research and technical assistance to find creative sentencing
strategies and practices and assess their effectiveness.

o Through the Community Gun Violence Prosecution portion of Project Safe
Neighborhoods, BJA will provide funding and support for prosecutors' offices
to improve their ability to prosecute gun crimes. 

o BJA will fund and support mental health courts that seek appropriate
alternatives to incarceration and services for offenders with mental illnesses or
disabilities. BJA will continue funding for drug courts formerly supported by
OJP's Drug Courts Program Office. 

o BJA will support the criminal defense community's efforts to ensure the fair
administration of justice by providing resources and technical assistance for
indigent defense. 

o In concert with the Department of the Treasury, BJA will help state and local
prosecutors develop and institutionalize capabilities to investigate and prosecute
money laundering offenses.

o BJA will support high-quality judicial training.

o BJA will support the highest quality DNA training and technical assistance for
prosecutors.

o BJA will provide training and technical assistance to court administrators.

"The goal of every reform we undertake should be to make preventing crime
and terrorism easier for our state and local partners." 

--Richard R. Nedelkoff, Director, Bureau of Justice Assistance

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Leadership for Drug Courts

In 1989, a few communities that were troubled by the devastating impact of
drugs and drug-related crime on their criminal justice systems took a new
approach to adjudicating low-level drug offenders. This new approach
integrated substance abuse treatment, sanctions, and incentives with case
processing to place nonviolent drug-involved defendants in judicially supervised
habilitation programs. The traditional system had rarely provided substance
abuse treatment to defendants in any systematic way and, in many cases,
provided little or no threat of sanctions to drug offenders.

In enacting the 1994 Crime Act, Congress joined local communities in
acknowledging the promise of drug courts in habilitating offenders, holding
offenders accountable for their actions, and reducing victimization. The 1994
Crime Act created the drug court grant program and authorized a technical
assistance initiative to provide leadership and support to the more than 500
courts that have implemented or are planning to implement a drug court.

As the Drug Courts Program Office joins BJA as part of the reorganization of
OJP, BJA will continue that office's diligent work to strengthen the drug court
movement and increase the effectiveness of local courts.

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Community and Institutional Corrections 

Supervising offenders in the community and preparing offenders for their return
to their communities are critical to protecting public safety. Community
supervision officers must balance the time required to manage growing
caseloads and their desire to provide offenders with the services they need to
become law-abiding citizens. At the same time, supervision officers increasingly
are concerned with their own safety as they find themselves more in the field
and less in the office.

Around the country, state and local probation and parole officials are testing
new ways to meet these challenges. One of the most exciting ideas is that of
building partnerships between law enforcement and community corrections.
These partnerships not only increase the safety of supervision officers, but offer
more services and better results than correctional institutions, and at a much
lower cost. In another increasingly popular and effective approach, reentry
programs provide a broad range of services for offenders while ensuring
accountability. 

o BJA will promote police-community corrections partnerships that provide a
higher level of supervision and offender accountability.

o BJA will support OJP reentry programs that provide training, treatment, and
supervision when offenders reenter our communities.

o BJA will work to provide tools, resources, and technical assistance needed
by rural probation and parole officers.

o BJA will develop guidance for community corrections officers and
administrators who want to create community correctional programs.

o BJA will work with professionals to share promising strategies and
partnerships that help offenders with mental illness.

o BJA will provide information on promising practices and creative solutions in
community-based treatment options.

o In coordination with OJP and OJJDP, BJA will invite national experts to
provide insight on how best we can provide useful tools and information to the
community corrections community.

o BJA will work with an international correctional association on a collaborative
initiative to address correctional workforce issues.

The corrections community not only works to keep criminals off our streets, but
also to prepare offenders for their return to their communities. Corrections
agencies know that they must do their best to give inmates opportunities to
develop life and work skills that will help their return be successful. Increasingly,
correctional facilities are using treatment, work, education, and mental health
programs to build these skills. 

At BJA, we believe that this direction is the only way to increase the chance
that the people who once preyed on our communities can return to them
without causing further harm. As a result, we will continue to support reentry
services in the criminal justice system by providing funding and assistance to
correctional programs that want to test alternatives to traditional incarceration
programs.

o BJA will support reentry programs that seek to provide the needed training,
treatment, and supervision offenders need to reenter our communities and live
law-abiding lives.

o BJA will work with national correctional associations and organizations to
develop and conduct regional policy and training forums for correctional staff
and community leaders.

o BJA will continue to support and operate the Prison Industries Enhancement
Certification Program. Through the program, which lifts restrictions on
prisoner-made goods for certified state corrections agencies, prisoners acquire
marketable skills that help them find meaningful employment after their release.

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Preparing Inmates for Reentry: The PIE Program

The Prison Industries Enhancement Certification Program (PIECP) encourages
states and units of local government to establish employment opportunities for
prisoners. The program places inmates in realistic work environments, pays
them prevailing wages, and gives them a chance to develop marketable skills
that will increase their potential for rehabilitation and meaningful employment
upon release. BJA certifies that each PIE program meets statutory and federal
guideline requirements. 

Currently, there are 34 state and 4 county-based certified correctional industry
programs in the United States, and these programs operate at least 175
business partnerships with private industry. In 2001, PIECP programs
generated more than $2.5 million for victims' programs, $1.7 million for inmate
family support, $10 million for correctional institution room and board costs,
and $4.5 million in state and federal taxes.

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Information Technology

The question of how to overcome obstacles to sharing information among law
enforcement and other criminal justice system components is a significant issue
that impacts the safety of Americans. In today's electronic age, the public has
grown to expect justice system integration and appropriate information sharing. 

All law enforcement and criminal justice agencies--local, state, and federal--
need to find ways to overcome obstacles to sharing information. Doing so not
only increases their ability to solve crimes and keep communities safer, it also
helps them meet their increasing responsibilities. While the sharing of
information must be the responsibility of criminal justice agencies, at BJA we
are committed to providing the resources and assistance needed to make it as
easy as possible. 

o BJA will work to increase the number of local, state, and federal law
enforcement agencies that use the Regional Information Sharing Systems.
Wider use of these innovative regional systems will go far to increase
intelligence sharing and secure communications among the thousands of law
enforcement agencies nationwide.

o Through its Information Technology Initiative, BJA, on behalf of OJP, will
continue to help the criminal justice system share information by providing
research and guidance on strategic planning and governance; standards,
infrastructure, and architecture; privacy and information quality; security; and
resource management issues. Additionally, BJA will continue to maintain the
OJP Information Technology Initiatives web site (www.it.ojp.gov) as a
resource for criminal justice practitioners nationwide.

o Through the Global Advisory Board, a group of key officials from local, state,
tribal, federal, and other justice-related organizations, BJA will continue
working to bring together representatives from the justice community to
overcome barriers to justice information sharing across agencies, disciplines,
and levels of government. 

o BJA will continue to support enhanced forensic capabilities, including the use
of DNA evidence, to assist in law enforcement, prosecution, and defense
needs.

o BJA will continue to support collaborative case management systems at the
local level and the inclusion of courts and prosecutors' offices in integrated
information systems.

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Project Safe Neighborhoods

Project Safe Neighborhoods (PSN) is a nationwide commitment to reducing
gun crime in America. PSN will create a network of existing local programs that
target gun crime and provide those programs with tools to be successful. 

o The Community Gun Violence Prosecution Program promotes the aggressive
enforcement of gun crimes by giving state and local prosecutors additional 
resources to focus on gun crimes.

o Project Safe Neighborhoods Research and Community Engagement Partner
grants are designed to support the strategic planning, accountability, and
community outreach components of U.S. Attorney-led gun violence task
forces.

o Project Sentry provides resources for state and local juvenile justice
prosecutors to increase their ability to focus on gun crimes committed by
juveniles.

o The Reducing Community Gun Violence Open Solicitation seeks to fund
demonstration projects that consist of locally crafted, innovative responses to
local need to reduce gun violence.

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Faith-Based Initiatives

In communities across the country, there are faith-based organizations that,
working alongside other community groups, form an army of compassion.
Crime prevention and criminal justice communities that fail to tap this resource
are missing opportunities. In many American communities, faith-based
organizations are the prime agents of change for social good.

Institutions of faith are ingrained in our communities and offer unique abilities to
reach both the people who are in need of help and those who are able to give
it. Although BJA should not fund or promote the religious activities of any
group, we want to ensure that when people of faith provide social services we
do not discriminate against them. BJA will promote the Administration's
faith-based initiatives by expanding their capacity through funding and support. 

o BJA will review its rules to ensure that we eliminate barriers that keep
faith-based programs from getting needed funding. Additionally, we will ensure
that faith-based organizations can do what we ask of them without changing
their mission. 

o In an effort to remove barriers to faith-based funding at the state and local
levels, BJA will work with national organizations, the White House Office of
Faith-Based and Community Initiatives, and the Justice Department Task Force
for Faith-Based and Community Initiatives to clarify faith-based funding rules
for our state administrative agencies.

o BJA will develop easy-to-use information for faith-based groups to help them
understand what types of funding are available and how to apply. 

o BJA will work to identify promising faith-based programs and share the
information in publications and on our web site.

"These quiet heroes lift people's lives in ways that are beyond government's 
know-how and they heal our nation's ills, one heart and one act of kindness at
a time." 

--President George W. Bush on faith-based and community organizations

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Taking Care of Those Who Protect Us

The Public Safety Officers' Benefits (PSOB) Program, administered by BJA,
provides financial benefits and education assistance to families of federal, state,
and local public safety officers killed or to officers permanently and totally
disabled in the line of duty. In FY 2001, PSOB responded to approximately
370 claims and awarded more than $26 million in benefits to surviving families.

Among BJA's first responses to the September 11 terrorist attacks was
expediting the payment of financial aid to the families of police officers and
firefighters killed in the attacks.

Immediately after the attacks, BJA staff began working to eliminate paperwork
for these claims, making payment possible in most cases within a few days.
Nearly 400 claims stemming from the attacks have been paid.

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BJA Bureau of Justice Assistance
Office of Justice Programs

U.S. Department of Justice

NCJ 197078