Meeting Between Baltimore Mayor Brandon Scott and UMD President Darryll J. Pines, PROGRESS Co-Directors

August 10th, 2026

Baltimore City Mayor Brandon Scott and members of his staff met with the University of Maryland’s president, Darryll J. Pines—and PROGRESS Co-Directors Jo Richardson and Woodie Kessel—to discuss Baltimore City’s success in reducing violence; the mayor and UMD president also discussed potential Baltimore-UMD collaboration to accelerate the city's positive crime reduction trends.  

President Pines began the conversation by commending Mayor Scott on Baltimore’s success. He then summarized national and local (National Capital Region) gun violence trends. Dr. Pines noted that firearm deaths in the US have declined significantly even as gun suicides are rising. He also observed that gun homicide fell unevenly within different demographic groups and varied widely across the US. He also shared that gun deaths for children now outnumber motor vehicle fatalities and are the leading cause of death for children (with firearm suicide increasing most among Black and Hispanic youth).  

President Pines noted that Baltimore has achieved one of the greatest reductions in firearm-related homicides among major cities in the United States. A rich discussion with Drs. Richardson and Kessel followed that highlighted several homicide reduction hypotheses; in particular, the PROGRESS co-directors recognized Baltimore’s investment in community violence intervention (CVI) and the importance of investing in young people as part of the Mayor’s gun violence prevention priorities. There was agreement that the Mayor’s Office would collaborate and share data with PROGRESS to advance Baltimore's efforts in gun violence prevention as specified in the 2026–2031 City of Baltimore Comprehensive Violence Prevention Plan.

Consistent with the Mayor’s priority of investing in young people, President Pines agreed to leverage the UMD C. Dan Mote Incentives Awards Program to increase enrollment of Baltimore high school students at the University of Maryland; he also proposed a unique UMD/Baltimore City partnership to help train city youth for firefighting and EMT jobs with the Baltimore City Fire Department and the UMD Maryland Fire Research Institute. 

Pictured left to right: PROGRESS Co-Directors Woodie Kessel and Jo Richardson, UMD President Darryll J. Pines, Baltimore Mayor Brandon Scott.