Ontario's provincial government has given the Toronto Police Service $10 million to keep fighting gang and gun-related crime.

The money, which is earmarked for the Toronto Anti-Violence Intervention Strategy (TAVIS), is enough to keep the program running for another two years.

"The strategy has one goal: To make life better for Toronto families by targeting guns and gangs, and making our streets safer," Community Safety Minister Jim Bradley told a news conference Tuesday in Scarborough's 41 Division.

TAVIS teams operate in high-risk parts of the city. They target the drug trade in those areas, along with the violent crime that often accompanies drugs.

The teams also work to identify gun offenders and gang members in those areas.

TAVIS has the capability to respond rapidly to trouble. It aims to prevent gun crime by arresting suspected drug dealers and gang members in troubled neighbourhoods.

It also aims to build trust with communities by offering after-school programs and recreational activities to at-risk youth.

Bradley claimed that TAVIS investigators have made more than 19,000 arrests and taken more than 1,200 firearms off the streets since the program began in 2006.

As one example, Bradley said that in 2009, TAVIS officers broke up two gangs operating in southeast Scarborough. They made nearly 50 arrests and seized 34 handguns, two AK-47s, cocaine and more than $430,000 in cash, he said.

The minister said since 2003, the year the Liberals took power, the crime rate has declined by 17 per cent, with violent crime down by 11 per cent.

Toronto Police Chief Bill Blair said that in 2005, Toronto was plagued by a spike in violent crime, and became known as the Year of the Gun. The city suffered a record number of gun homicides, capped by the Boxing Day shooting of teenager Jane Creba as she was out shopping on Yonge Street with her sister.

TAVIS was created in response response to address the fear that had gripped residents, he said.

Blair said the provincial funding supplements the existing guns and gangs unit.

TAVIS, which comprises four teams of 18 officers each, gives police the ability to respond rapidly to violence wherever it is occurring and to proactively work to prevent future violence, he said.

'We have been very effective in dismantling some of the worst gangs in this city, and we are making a difference," Blair said.

With a report from CTV Toronto's Austin Delaney