Story Search Results

Advanced Search

There are so many ways to search the solutions journalism stories in this database. Explore our searchable fields:

Search Results

You searched for: -

There are 79 results for your search. View and Refine Your Search Terms

Survivors of Gangs and Gun Violence, These Women Now Help Others Navigate Grief

Cara Anthony

December 23, 2022 |

Kaiser Health News |

Text |

1500-3000 Words

Response Location: United States, East St. Louis, Illinois

Survivors of gangs and gun violence, April Roby-Bell, Terra Jenkins, and Larita Rice-Barnes work to support people in the community grieving loved ones lost due to gun violence. They have formed nonprofits like the Metro East Organizing Coalition, and churches like the Restoration Outreach Center and host rallies and help organize funerals for families in need.

Read More
Go to Original Story
How Chinese-built railway projects are easing mobility, saving lives in Nigeria

Niyi Oyedeji

March 22, 2022 |

International Centre for Investigative Reporting |

Text |

1500-3000 Words

Response Location: Nigeria

The Abuja-Kaduna standard gauge railway has helped increase travel safety across Nigeria. Many commuters have had to deal with kidnapping and violence while traveling but trains provide secure modes of transportation. They are also a more affordable alternative to air travel. The Abuja-Kaduna railway was mainly funded by project-tied loans from China. Because of the increased comfort, reliability, and safety, train lines are expanding throughout the country.

Read More
Go to Original Story
In Venezuela, a Rum Maker Offers Gangsters a Life Outside of Crime

Isayen Herrera Anatoly Kurmanaev

October 16, 2021 |

The New York Times |

Multi-Media |

800-1500 Words

Response Location: Venezuela, Sabaneta

Rather than fleeing or fighting the twin threats to its business from criminal gangs and an aggressively anti-business government, the managers of Venezuelan rum-maker Ron Santa Teresa chose to make peace with both through social programs that have calmed what once was one of the violent country's most troubled towns. The company's Proyecto Alcatraz creates economic opportunity for gang members, providing them with job training and psychological counseling. It also courted favor with the socialist government with a housing initiative for the poor. Both programs have proved a boon for business.

Read More
Go to Original Story
'Gang Contracts' in Cicero and Berwyn Schools Raise Concerns About Criminalization of Youth

Irene Romulo

May 26, 2021 |

Cicero Independiente |

Text |

Over 3000 Words

Response Location: United States, Cicero, Illinois

"Gang contracts" are used by many schools as a way to tell students they are suspected of gang activity and must avoid such activity or face discipline or expulsion. Gang contracts have been put to extensive use in the high schools and middle schools of two towns, Cicero and Berwyn, that underwent large demographic shifts toward more Latinx residents since the 1990s. Meant to make schools safer and put students on a better path, they have been based often on vague, unsubstantiated suspicions in Cicero and Berwyn. Critics cite evidence that young people are wrongly criminalized and denied educations.

Read More
Go to Original Story
How a US strategy is helping gang members in Malmö turn their lives around

Anne Grietje Franssen

April 29, 2021 |

The Local |

Text |

1500-3000 Words

Response Location: Sweden, Malmö

When drug-gang violence reached intolerable levels in Malmö in 2017, Swedish crime prevention officials traveled to New York for tips. There they learned about a gang violence intervention strategy in which gang members are summoned to a meeting with law enforcement, community, and social-services representatives. They are told about the harm they are causing, are offered help in changing their lifestyle, and are warned that they will be prosecuted otherwise. In Malmö since then, hundreds heard that message, dozens accepted the help, and violence dropped significantly year after year.

Read More
Go to Original Story
How Kenya turned the tide against ivory poachers

Andres Schipani

April 27, 2021 |

Financial Times |

Text |

800-1500 Words

Response Location: Kenya, Nanyuki

More and more park rangers, judges, prosecutors, and wildlife investigators are working together to stop poaching in Kenya. Through training and a new app that allows all parties to track wild animals in a protected conservation area, the number of poaching cases has decreased from 449 creatures killed illegally in 2021 to 93 in 2018. The number of court cases have also decreased in recent years.

Read More
Go to Original Story
The Mexican women who kicked out the cartels

Monica Wise Robles Richard Sprenger Katie Lamborn Charlie Phillips

April 15, 2021 |

The Guardian |

Video |

5-15 Minutes

Response Location: Mexico, Cherán, Michoacan

Ten years after the women of Cherán, an indigenous town in Michoacán, took up arms to lead an uprising against criminal cartels, their town is an "oasis" of low crime in a region otherwise beset with violence. The town declared itself autonomous and women now belong to the community police force that patrols the town and its surroundings. The cartels' illegal logging and extortion of businesses had corrupted local politicians and threatened a way of life. The town's men did nothing about it, so the women led the uprising that established order and kept the crime at bay.

Read More
Go to Original Story
Fighting the Mafia on Its Own Turf

Rhodri Davies

March 23, 2021 |

The New York Times |

Text |

800-1500 Words

Response Location: Italy, Alto Belice Corleonese

La Placido Rizzotto is one of nine farm co-ops in a network of properties that were seized from Sicily's Mafia and reused to create a productive alternative to the area's crime-based economy. Part of the Libera Terra (Freed Land) network, La Placido Rizzotto employs 22 people and its farm, winery, and tourist inn generated nearly $900,000 in sales in 2019. The government has confiscated thousands of properties in its effort to hurt the Mafia economically, but managing the properties remains a challenge that the "social use" movement addresses. Libera Terra's model has been copied by an Argentinian co-op.

Read More
Go to Original Story
In a Mafia Stronghold, This Cooking School Is Stirring the Pot

Agostino Petroni

February 01, 2021 |

Reasons to be Cheerful |

Text |

1500-3000 Words

Response Location: Italy, Bianco, Calabria

Italy's first tuition-free cooking school gives unemployed young people in the economically challenged region of Calabria a career path – and a culturally resonant alternative to working for the region's organized crime syndicate, the 'Ndrangheta. The school, Uno Chef per Elena e Pietro, surrounds cooking instruction with an appreciation for food culture and farming. Besides the extortion, kidnappings, and murder that the Calabrian Mafia uses, it also launders money by infiltrating farming and the food business.

Read More
Go to Original Story
How 60 reporters from 25 media outlets in 18 countries are finishing the work of murdered journalists

Amaris Castillo

January 25, 2021 |

Poynter |

Text |

800-1500 Words

Response Location: Mexico

The Cartel Project formed an international team of journalists that produced a five-part series on the murder of Mexican journalist Regina Martinez. The series also explored the subjects that Martinez's killers attempted to silence: particulars about drug trafficking and political corruption. The project was founded on the principle that journalism must be a cross-border collaboration to counter transnational crime syndicates. The series documented the role Mexicans play in the international drug business and in spying on and censoring journalists who seek to reveal these secrets.

Read More
Go to Original Story