The Philadelphia Center for Gun Violence Reporting has been created to explore the hypothesis that changing the way journalists and news organizations report on gun violence can prevent shootings and save lives. We propose that empowering people with lived experience will be a critical next step in changing the narrative from law enforcement and criminal justice to more productive perspectives including public health, evidence-based responses and prevention. The secret sauce behind our work includes three groups of people: journalists who report on gun violence locally and nationally, researchers from a broad spectrum of disciplines and community representatives with extensive lived experience. At present we are developing a new journalism network, partnering on new three-year research collaborative and making plans to refine and expand our Credible Messenger Reporting Project.