Approach
Building Infrastructure for Community-Led Safety
Communities need more than reform. They need viable systems that prevent harm, respond effectively, and increase accountability. The Center for Community Alternatives to Policing builds the infrastructure that makes those systems possible.
Our theory of change
What we do
Meet the Team
-
FounderPriscilla Ocen is a nationally recognized scholar and advocate at the forefront of law, race, and criminal legal reform. She is a professor at Loyola Law School in Los Angeles, where her work examines how race, gender, and class shape policing and punishment, centering the experiences of Black women and marginalized communities.
Ocen is a founder of the Center for Community Alternatives to Policing, advancing community-based strategies that move beyond punitive systems toward models of safety rooted in equity, accountability, and care. A Fulbright Fellow, Leading Edge Fellow, and inaugural PEN America Writing for Justice Fellow, she bridges scholarship, policy, and public engagement.
She has published leading scholarship in the California Law Review and written for The Atlantic. Her expertise has been widely featured in national media, including Time Magazine, The Washington Post, and the Los Angeles Times.
-
TitleAlicia Virani is a social justice lawyer, restorative justice practitioner and abolitionist. She has over 15 years of experience building power with communities to advance public safety strategies and to redistribute wealth to address historic and present-day inequalities. Alicia has a wide range of advocacy experience. She has engaged in direct representation as a public defender in the criminal legal system, civil rights litigation, research and data analysis, restorative justice program implementation and legislative and policy advocacy. Alicia also created and taught two innovative classes at UCLA School of Law: the Pretrial Justice Clinic and Reenvisioning the Lawyer’s Role: Trauma-Informed Lawyering and Restorative/Transformative Justice. Alicia has authored numerous reports in partnership with community organizations, which have led to significant policy changes locally and statewide, specifically related to pretrial justice. Alicia completed her undergraduate education at Vassar College and received her J.D. and Masters in Urban Planning from UCLA.
Safety Is Camapign
Few initiatives document and elevate community assets—such as healing spaces, youth programs, cultural hubs, peer support, and mutual aid—that promote safety outside of policing and punishment. As a result, funding continues to prioritize punitive approaches over preventative, community-driven strategies.
This initiative shifts the narrative by documenting and amplifying community-led safety efforts rooted in care, healing, and equity. It positions residents as experts of their own safety by creating a living map of local resources and delivering resident-informed recommendations to decision-makers.
Led by residents in Compton, East Los Angeles, and the Antelope Valley, the initiative will identify community assets, elevate local voices through storytelling, and produce actionable recommendations for countywide safety strategies.
Asset Mapping
By partnering with community organizations, the Center will train residents to identify local spaces, organizations, and practices that foster healing and safety. The findings will be made available in a publicly accessible interactive map and database.
Multimedia Campaign
Residents will share testimonies—through video, audio, and art—about what makes them feel safe. Content will be distributed via social media, community events, and partner networks.
Final Report
We analyze asset-mapping data and testimonies to produce a countywide report highlighting effective community-led safety strategies, which are shared through public forums and policy briefings.
