Moving the Mission: Field Insights from the 2025 CVI Conference
The Community Violence Intervention Conference is the nation’s largest convening dedicated to advancing community-led, non-punitive responses to gun violence.
Established to address a critical gap in the field, it creates space for those most impacted by violence to lead the conversation and shape the direction of national strategy. What began with just over 650 attendees in 2023 has grown to nearly 1,000 attendees in 2025, highlighting the field’s accelerating growth and the need for cross-sector coordination, sustained investment, and integration into broader public safety agendas.
As programs face deep funding cuts and limited opportunities to gather, this convening plays a critical role in keeping the field connected and grounded in frontline realities. It offers space for those doing the work every day to speak honestly about what they are seeing, what’s working, and what support they need to keep going. In a moment when the future of this work is under pressure, the path forward must be shaped by the people living it.
This report is a synthesis of what was shared across sessions, conversations, and reflections throughout the 2025 CVI Conference. It was created with two core goals:
- To share tools, resources, and opportunities that attendees identified to strengthen CVI efforts nationwide. This includes concrete practices, toolkits, training materials, and implementation strategies that can be applied, adapted, or scaled in local contexts.
- To reflect on the state of the field by tracing the themes, questions, and tensions that emerged over the course of the convening.
By identifying what is gaining momentum, what gaps persist, and where alignment is still needed, this document helps us take inventory of where the field stands and what it will take to keep moving forward.
CHAMPIONS FOR PEACE
Our Champions for Peace series honors the people working on the ground to stop violence in their communities before it happens. If someone comes to mind as you read this, take a moment to nominate them.
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SPOTLIGHT
COMMUNITY INTERVENTION
Community violence intervention focuses on reducing the daily homicides and shootings that contribute to our country’s gun violence epidemic. We created Giffords Center for Violence Intervention to champion community-based efforts to save lives and improve public safety.
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