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NEIGHBORHOOD RESTORATION PLANWeed & Seed ProgramSouth Bend, IndianaPage 7South Bend Weed & Seed ProgramSouth Bend Weed & Seed ProgramIn 2002, a portion of the City of South Bend, Indiana, was designated a Weed and Seed Community by the US Department of Justice. This unique program provides resources to assist communities in four areas:1) Control of violent crime, drug trafficking, and drug-related crime in targeted neighborhoods.2) Provision of safe environments free of crime and drug use for residents.3) Cooperation of law enforcement agencies and prosecutors in “weeding out” criminals from target areas.4) “Seeding” to bring prevention, intervention, treatment and neighborhood revitalization services to target areas in order to meet social service and economic revitalization needs.Four committees were established to deal with particular aspects of the Weed & Seed Program, including Law Enforcement; Community Policing; Prevention, Intervention, and Treatment (social service needs); and Neighborhood Restoration. This plan was prepared for the Neighborhood Restoration Committee in order to identify needs of target area neighborhoods and strategic programs to bring about positive change.The strategies and programs identified in this plan build upon four key underlying principles:CollaborationCollaborationto establish permanent channels of communication among stakeholders and partnerships among organizations with similar goals, to identify strategic and innovative approaches to effective crime prevention and neighborhood restoration, and to build broad support for the Weed & Seed strategies.CoordinationCoordinationto effectively concentrate resources in the designated neighborhoods, better match available services with community needs, identify and eliminate overlaps and duplication of efforts, and maximize benefits from existing services and programs.Community ParticipationCommunity Participationto empower residents to solve their own problems and to function more effectively so as to limit dependence on “outsiders” to meet neighborhood needs.Leveraging ResourcesLeveraging Resourcesfrom a variety of sources to fully fund plan strategies. Weed & Seed disseminates funding as seed money to help access other funds.INTRODUCTIONINTRODUCTIONINTRODUCTION