Businessman and former Steeler Chuck Sanders is throwing his support behind the city's new anti-gang initiative, the Pittsburgh Initiative to Reduce Crime.

On Thursday, Chuck Sanders Charities will announce a $100,000 grant to help provide jobs to gang members who want to turn their lives around.

The money will subsidize the gang members' wages at jobs provided by community groups or other employers, according to a statement issued by the charity today.

"I know it is easy to ask these young men and women to put down the guns and stop the crime. However, we must show them, as well as offer, alternatives to their current way of living. I stand with each PIRC participant who believes sincerely in, and is committed to, a new way of life and I commit that this jobs fund was established for you and will help you in staying on that positive and progressive path," Mr. Sanders said in a statement.

PIRC, modeled on a heralded Boston program, takes a zero-tolerance approach to gang-related homicides.

About 55 members of 37 gangs citywide were summoned to meetings July 13. They were told that a murder committed by a member of any one gang will bring a police crackdown on all members of that gang.

At the same time, gang members were offered comprehensive social services and a chance to turn their lives around.

"The overall objective here is to help PIRC participants avoid violence and crime, while legitimately providing for themselves and carrying the PIRC message of non-violence back to their respective groups and communities," Mr. Sanders said.

Mr. Sanders grew up in Homewood and Penn Hills and graduated from Slippery Rock University of Pennsylvania. In the mid 1980s, he played two seasons for the Steelers as a running back and special-teams player.

In 1998, he and his wife, Elisa Todd Sanders, founded North Side-based Urban Settlement Services Inc., which describes itself as the nation's largest minority-owned settlement services company.

Thursday's announcement will be made at Mr. Sanders' home church, Macedonia Baptist, in the Hill District.

"We're extremely grateful. We're thankful," mayoral spokeswoman Joanna Doven said, for Mr. Sanders' help in "reaching out to our young people who want to change their path."

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