PORTLAND, Ore. (KOIN) — A community organization will discuss a new proposal for reducing gun violence in Portland on Thursday.
Leaders from the Inter-Faith Peace & Action Collaborative (IPAC) will hold a virtual press conference at 1:30 p.m. to announce the community-based action plan.
IPAC is a group of faith leaders, activists, social workers, police officers and community members founded in 2016. The organization’s goal is to address street violence in Portland, specifically violence impacting communities of color.
KOIN 6 News will attend Thursday’s event and update this story.
In early March, Portland police reported 18 homicides — 13 of which were related to gun violence — in the city since the start of 2021.
Police said the new Enhanced Community Safety Team launched in February is helping the bureau investigate these homicides. The new team focuses only on the investigative angle, which sets it apart from the old Gun Violence Reduction Team disbanded in the summer of 2020. The GVRT took a more proactive approach, which involved patrols and contacting people to collect intelligence.