City officials unveiled a new initiative Tuesday to help combat the high numbers of assault and harassment within the community.

The Help Encourage changes in Attitude and Life program, or H.E.A.L., will partner with leaders in the community to deliver treatment and intervention strategies to first-time assault or harassment offenders for four to six weeks.

Selma Chief of Police William T. Riley said the initiative will focus on issues such as conflict resolution and anger management, and is based on the premise of what the department does for DUI and domestic violence offenders.

“We recognize that one of the biggest issues of dealing with assaults, assault and battery, harassment and even larger issues such as felony assaults is the issue of communication,” Riley said. “The lack of communication individuals have between themselves — that they cannot solve their problems — that’s where H.E.A.L. comes in place.”

Instead of just convicting an individual for an assault or harassment charge, Riley said officials are going to look deeper to find out what’s causing the problem.

“We’re going to look at providing training and providing therapy to deal with conflict resolution and anger management because what we’re trying to do is get to the root of the problem,” Riley said. “Break the cycle.”

The program, which is free of cost to the city, was also designed to help decrease the number of assault and harassment related calls placed to the Selma Police Department each day.

Last year, 1,074 assault-related incidents and 1,845 harassment-related incidents were listed in the city of Selma, most of which revolved around individuals not being able to solve their differences without resorting to violence or threats of violence, he said.

“That’s a lot of calls for services that are placed upon the city’s police department,” Riley said. “That’s a lot of resources that are drawn from the city as a whole. What we’re trying to do is break that particular cycle, get people trained and get them to understand how to talk to each other.”

Mayor George Evans said the program is something that both Selma and Dallas County are in need of.

“With all the crime that’s going on and the numbers [Riley has] indicated, it reflects that there needs to be a process in place, a healing,” Evans said. “I support this and look forward to this program being an asset to our community and getting our community to buy into it and be supportive.”

Offenders who partake in the program must actively participate in it, Riley said, and those who stop attending or do not complete it will be brought back before a judge, who will review the circumstances of the situation and make a decision accordingly.

“We can’t continue to decide to incarcerate our people,” State Rep. Darrio Melton (D-District 67) said. “This shows us that we have people in this community who care about our people, who will not continue to incarcerate people.

“We’re going to make sure that people are being healed right here in Selma and Dallas County.”