KANSAS CITY, Mo. -- A peace conference over the weekend focused on working with the community to create peace and put an end to violence.
Kansas City police are doing something similar in their East Patrol Division, but Captain Stacey Graves says they need help from the public to curb the violence.
"We have several initiatives but all of that is not good unless we have the community that is coming together with us,” said Graves.
"That's what this conference is about. The idea that it takes a community to peace build,” said Steven Youngblood, director of the Center for Global Peace Journalism.
Experts from across the country gathered to exchange ideas on how to create peace and promote nonviolence.
The conference was a way for people to learn new tools to combat the problems facing their communities.
"We need to build alliances with each other and we need to build coalitions and places like this allow that to happen,” said Sita Ranchod-Nilsson Director of Emory University’s Institute for Developing Nations.
Building a connection with the people in the community they serve is exactly what the Kansas City Police Department is trying to do.
"East Patrol is trying to get out to the community so that we have those relationships. If someone knows about a conflict leading up to something like this that they contact us and maybe we can intervene before something like this happens,” said Graves.
