In response to high levels of gun violence experienced since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, the Illinois Department of Human Services Office of Firearm Violence Prevention (OFVP), together with Cook County’s Justice Advisory Council (JAC), announced $25 million in grants to fund a diverse array of service providers focused on supporting residents at risk of experiencing gun violence in Chicago and Suburban Cook County. In Summer 2022, the JAC awarded a historic initial $75 million in Gun Violence Prevention and Reduction Grants, funding individual organizations and coalitions that represent 68 services providers. Partnering with Illinois Department of Human Services’ Office of Firearm Violence Prevention allows Cook County the opportunity to leverage State funding from the federal American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA), to expand upon JAC’s successful funding model that provides vital support to vulnerable and at-risk residents in communities most impacted by crime, violence, and incarceration. Through this second funding cycle of $25 million, another 39 grant awards to individual organizations and coalitions will support 74 service providers working to build safer communities in Cook County and Chicagoland. The $75 million of 2022 funding builds on over $50 million in County funded grant investments distributed by the JAC between 2015 and 2020. More information about Cook County’s Gun Violence Prevention and Reduction Grant Initiative is available here: https://www.cookcountyil.gov/JACGrants