Philadelphia spends money on anti-violence efforts. It must invest in making sure they work. | Editorial

Mayor Jim Kenney likes to boast that he has dedicated more money to fight gun violence than “any administration in history.” But is anyone making sure the money is well spent?

Indeed, the city increased anti-violence funding 35% to $208 million in the 2023 fiscal year. That’s over and above the $788 million Philadelphia Police Department budget.

In all, the city is spending nearly $1 billion on public safety, yet few residents feel safe.

Nearly 1,800 people were shot last year and 516 were murdered. (New York, which has more than five times Philadelphia’s population, had 433 murders.)

So where is all the anti-violence money going?

» READ MORE: A new year requires a better plan to tackle gun violence crisis | Editorial

Taxpayers got a troubling peek into the spending for one program when Inquirer reporters Max Marin and Samantha Melamed dug into a youth boxing initiative designed to reduce gun violence called Guns Down Gloves Up.

It sounds like a worthy idea, offering young people an outlet for stress and a healthy way to deal with their emotions, except The Inquirer story paints a picture of a hodgepodge operation lacking accountability, and oversight.

During the pandemic, Police Capt. Nashid Akil and fellow Officer George Gee pitched the city’s Office of Violence Prevention on a pop-up boxing program for kids outside the 22nd Police District office in North Philadelphia.

Flash forward to December 2021, with Akil’s support, the city awarded a $392,000 grant for the Guns Down Gloves Up program to Epiphany Fellowship Church along with Villanova University as a subcontractor.

The application said Akil would volunteer his time and not be paid. That makes sense, as city employees are not eligible to receive city grants. But somehow, nearly $76,000 went to Akil and nine other Police Department staffers, including Gee, and his wife and daughter, who both work in the department, according to documents obtained by The Inquirer through an open-records request.

In October, a separate Inquirer story detailed Akil’s spotty attendance at his $117,500-a-year day job running a busy police district office in a violent section of the city.

The cops weren’t the only ones making money from the Guns Down Gloves Up program.

Epiphany received $45,000, which included a 10% administrative fee for “overhead, copying, etc.”

Also, $6,000 went to cleaning services at the church. One invoice listed “bio cleaning” the pastor’s closet.

Villanova received $45,000 for research and evaluation — plus its own 10% administrative fee.

Boxing participants received more than $13,000 in prepaid debit cards and $350 if they completed four weeks of the program.

In all, Guns Down Gloves Up blew through $200,000 in less than a year. In November, the city suspended the program as investigations were launched by the police and the city’s inspector general.

Erica Atwood, the city’s deputy managing director who heads the Office of Policy and Strategic Initiatives for Criminal Justice and Public Safety, said “this was not something that we could have predicted.”

What was the first clue, then? The payment to the “volunteer” cops, or the bill to clean the pastor’s closet?

The program seems lacking from the start. A photo that accompanied The Inquirer story showed two kids with boxing gloves on a sidewalk punching a pole.

This is not the first anti-violence program that has floundered. One of the city’s main gun violence prevention efforts, the Community Crisis Intervention Program, failed to properly train staffers and meet basic goals.

Anti-violence programs are needed and can work. But the programs must be vetted for efficacy and have proper oversight and financial controls.

» READ MORE: Are any of Philly’s anti-violence tactics working? Without better tracking, we’ll never know. | Editorial

Former City Controller Rebecca Rhynhart, now running for mayor, released an audit in 2021 that found the bulk of city spending on anti-violence programs would take several years to show meaningful results.

If the youth boxing boondoggle is any indication, Rhynhart’s audit may have underestimated the programs’ ineffectiveness.

A separate audit last year depicted a Philadelphia Police Department that was disorganized and inefficient, while another Inquirer report detailed cops claiming injuries while working side hustles. Not to mention, the recent parade of former police officers going to prison for various crimes.

Meanwhile, the number of murders in Philadelphia has more than doubled in 10 years, while shootings seemingly keep coming every couple of hours.

Shootings and crime have increased across the country. But when it comes to public safety in Philadelphia, it feels like no one in the Kenney administration is minding the store.