Today, the Brother Carl Hardrick Institute for Violence Prevention and Community Engagement (BCHI) will certify its first class of the Brother Carl Hardrick Intervention Specialist Training. The four-day training course is dedicated to immediate and long-term goals to reduce gun violence and other violent crimes within the community. State Senator Doug McCrory (D-Hartford), a member of the BCHI Board of Ambassadors, will present plaques of certification to the course participants. He will be joined by House Speaker Matt Ritter and state Representative Joshua Hall – fellow members of the Hartford delegation and BCHI ambassadors – and United States Senator Richard Blumenthal. 

WHEN:
Today, Thursday, December 9 at 4 p.m.

WHERE:
Wilson Gray YMCA (444 Albany Ave Hartford, CT)

 WHO:

• State Senator Doug McCrory
• House Speaker Matt Ritter
• U.S. Senator Richard Blumenthal – participating virtually
• State Representative Joshua Hall
• Participants in the inaugural class of the Brother Carl Hardrick Intervention Specialist Training
• BCHI Board of Ambassadors – participating in-person or virtually

 WHAT:
The inaugural class of the Brother Carl Hardrick Intervention Specialist Training will be certified following the completion of the last day of the training course. The BCHI was founded by local leaders in the Black and Jewish communities to prevent violence on a neighborhood-by-neighborhood level across Connecticut. The organization is spearheaded by a 28-member Board of Ambassadors led by Co-Chairs JoAnn Price, Co-Founder and Managing Partner of Fairview Capital, and Stephen Bayer, Community Trustee of the Jewish Federation of Greater Hartford.

The BCHI Board of Ambassadors comprises of leaders in government, social services, medicine, and health. The group which includes State of Connecticut Commissioner of the Department of Emergency Services and Public Protection James Rovella; Brian Foley, Assistant to Commissioner Rovella; state Senator Doug McCrory; House Speaker Matt Ritter; state Representative Joshua M. Hall; and CEO Reginald Eadie of Trinity Health of New England are coming together on a mission to help stop gun violence in the community. 

The trainees are from different agencies in Hartford, New Haven, Bridgeport, Waterbury and throughout the State of Connecticut. The training will coordinate with Health Alliance for Violence Intervention (HAVI) for national certification training.

“Community gun violence intervention programs are critical to stopping the epidemic of shootings and deaths, especially in our urban centers. The Carl Hardrick Institute is continuing the work of one of Hartford’s great heroes and ensuring that community leaders and activists are adequately trained to be effective interventionists. I strongly support these efforts and will continue to fight for more resources to bolster and broaden community violence prevention programs,” said Richard Blumenthal, United States Senator for Connecticut, about the BCHI and its violence intervention training efforts.

For more information on the course training program, contact Francine Austin of Francine Entertainment & Marketing at Francine1austin@gmail.com or 860-655-6322.

 *Media interested in viewing the last day of training may use the below Zoom link. Permission is granted to media outlets to record the in-progress training*