In May 2021, Mayor Bottoms convened the Anti-Violence Advisory Council tasked with recommending immediate and long-term recommendations to address violent crime within the city. The Advisory Council has delivered its recommendations, which can be viewed here.

The Advisory Council developed the recommendations by reviewing existing anti-violence efforts already underway by the Mayor’s Administration and the Atlanta Police Department (APD). The Council provided three overarching recommendations with a series of action items intended to complement or bolster the current crime reduction efforts.

The Anti-Violence Advisory Council recommendations include:

• Creation of a Mayor's Office of Violence Reduction
• Launching, continuing or expanding nine critical initiatives focused on locations and individuals most impacted by violence
• Investing $70 million to fund the nine critical initiatives

The Mayor’s Office of Violence Reduction would be a dedicated crime prevention office that leads, coordinates and supports the City’s initiatives.

The nine critical initiatives for violence reduction include: public awareness, community capacity and infrastructure building, expansion of programs focused on violence prevention, local security planning, focus on violent repeat offenders, increased enforcement of nuisance properties, hiring 250 additional officers in FY22, expanding the City’s Operation Shield camera network by 250 cameras this year and completing the One Atlanta: Light Up the Night program to install 10,000 new streetlights in high violence areas by December 2021.

The Council recommended dedicating $70 million to fund the nine initiatives—comprised of $50 million in public funding and $20 million from private and philanthropic funds.

The report also includes recommendations for long-term initiatives to continue crime prevention efforts.

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