Over the past two years, Baltimore City has witnessed over 5,000 felony cases charged and closed, more than 1,700 repeat, violent offenders put behind bars with a sentence of five years without the possibility of parole, and nearly 300 individuals convicted of murder. Over three years, we have seen 355 individuals prosecuted through the mayor’s Gun Violence Reduction Strategy (GVRS), and 201 offered services instead of prosecution.

These numbers don’t make one area of public safety less impactful than the other; instead, they highlight the areas where various agencies have worked hard together to tackle the underlying crime issue. For instance, GVRS is a process that combines the dedication of the men and women in the Mayor’s Office of Neighborhood Safety and Engagement (MONSE) who track the data to find the areas of violence led by groups of individuals perpetrating these violent crimes, with the hard work of the brave men and women making the arrests within the city’s police department.

This process also includes the prosecutors from my office acting as the hammer in this carrot-and-stick approach, offering these offenders a way forward without jail if they accept the services provided by MONSE and outside community groups. The governor’s office plays a role by financing these efforts through federal and state grants while also benefiting from the efforts of the state attorney general’s office, the U.S. attorney’s office and other federal partners who help make these efforts possible.

While we have worked strategically to take repeat, violent offenders off the streets of Baltimore, we must remain cognizant of the fact that they will ultimately return to our communities in a matter of years, a fact that underscores the vitally important work that still lies ahead. As leaders of Baltimore, we must focus less on celebrating the current downtrend in crime that we have enjoyed over the past two years and more on how we will provide services to those men and women who are set to return in the next two to four years.

While MONSE and GVRS provide much-needed services to those willing to put the guns and drugs down, it is clear that those who are currently “in the game” are less willing to accept these services. Therefore, we need to remain smart on crime by targeting the more than 1,700 men and women my office has put behind bars for five years without parole over the past two years, who will be returning home over the next few years, possibly without the resources necessary for successful reentry.

I commend the measurable services provided by MONSE and the mayor’s GVRS approach to crime. We must remember that this targeted approach to tackling crime remains specific to only a handful of Baltimore’s nine police districts. Therefore, we should temper expectations regarding the number of individuals served by this program.

That is why I feel that we need to take this same approach to those on the back end of the criminal justice system by targeting the thousands of men and women who are set to return to our communities without a viable plan of success.

Here, we have a captive audience of individuals who have the opportunity to begin reflecting on their life’s future and the unique opportunity to take advantage of the many services and programs offered by MONSE. We need to provide these individuals with job training and employment development, GEDs and other educational advancement tools before they are put back on the streets.

I believe the mayor’s office has developed timely intervention efforts through not only MONSE but also the Mayor’s Office of African American Male Engagement and the collaborative work it’s done with groups such as We Our Us. But now we need to refocus the strategies around GVRS to target those we have successfully put in prison over these past two years; otherwise, these “trigger-pullers” will be back on our streets with no marketable skills or opportunity to “go legit,” and we will ultimately see violence increase, and homicides and non-fatal shootings will follow.

As President John F. Kennedy famously said, “Partnership is not a posture but a process — a continuous process that grows stronger each year as we devote ourselves to common tasks.” As long as I remain the elected representative of the people of this great city as their chief crime fighter, I will always lead by example collaboratively and intentionally, seeking to make Baltimore the safest city in America.

Ivan J. Bates (SA@stattorney.org) is state’s attorney for Baltimore City.