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Yahoo
12 hours ago
- Health
- Yahoo
Shootings dropped in Lansing, but untangling why is complicated
Police ballistic markers stand besides a child's chair and bicycle at a crime scene in Brooklyn where a one year old child was shot and killed on July 13, 2020 in New York City. (Photo by) This story was published in partnership with The Trace, a nonprofit newsroom covering gun violence. As gun violence surged in cities across the country after the start of the pandemic and the murder of George Floyd, shootings rose even more steeply in Lansing, Michigan. The worst period came in 2021, when the rate of fatal shootings reached 20 per 100,000 residents, two points higher than the national rate. 'That wave was so devastating,' said Marlon Beard, a community activist in Lansing whose 17-year-old son, Marshawn, was shot and killed in 2021. 'We all kind of asked ourselves what we can do about it.' In response, city officials and community groups raised enough money from federal grants and the city to establish a local Advance Peace program, a national violence intervention method that identifies known shooters, with support from the police, and enrolls them in an 18-month fellowship. By late 2022, violence interrupters hit the ground in southwest Lansing, mentoring, conducting skills training, and providing job opportunities to 15 participants. Within months, police data showed a decline in shootings. To better understand the program's efficacy, Advance Peace leaders commissioned a study by the Michigan Public Health Institute and Michigan State University. The study, published in March, found a 19 percent decrease in all shooting incidents from October 2022 to September 2024. More specifically, it found a 52 percent decline in fatal shootings and a 10 percent decline in nonfatal shootings. A program that works directly with shooters in Lansing is finding success — and police support But the overall drop also coincided with a national decrease in gun violence as the pandemic receded. Determining how much of the decline was due to intervention and how much it reflected national trends remains a key part of the puzzle in understanding gun violence trends in Lansing and similar cities. The end of the pandemic also heralded the federal Build Back Better Act, which included $5 billion for community violence intervention work, along with less direct funding that strengthened the social safety net that is crucial in many communities with disproportionate rates of gun deaths. That widespread funding anchored programs like this one. The first 18-month Advance Peace fellowship started in late 2022 with 15 fellows on the southwest side, where shootings were most prevalent. Fatal shootings and nonfatal shootings fell by 38 percent and 32 percent, respectively, in that area. But the drop in fatal shootings was greater in the three sections of the city where Advance Peace didn't have an initial presence, raising questions about the program's influence. The southwest did, however, have the largest reduction in nonfatal shootings compared to the other areas. According to the Lansing study, Advance Peace effectively engaged with the people most likely to pick up a gun, who were identified through family members, friends, other activists, law enforcement, and people recently released from jails and prisons. More than 90 percent of participants no longer use guns to go on the offensive, said Paul Elam, the chief strategy officer at the Michigan Public Health Institute and a key member of the team that implemented the program in Lansing. Elam later took a step back from street-level engagement to join the research team. 'We have evidence that this works,' he said. 'We have the evidence to prove that a public health approach works.' Joseph Richardson, a gun violence researcher and professor at the University of Maryland, said the Advance Peace model can be successful, but more data is needed to show that the program was driving the drop in shootings. 'There were significant reductions in fatal shootings where they weren't doing their work,' Richardson said, but added that continued research of community violence intervention programs is crucial to better understanding 'the role a CVI group plays locally. That's how we learn what steps need to be taken to implement the work properly.' The second fellowship, which covers the entire city, started in July 2024 and will continue working with 55 fellows until December, when the Trump administration's termination of $169 million in grants for violence intervention and community safety programs leaves cities like Lansing to scramble for alternatives. Half of Advance Peace Lansing's funding comes from federal grants, and its leaders are now strategizing about how to raise enough money to sustain the organization's 22-person staff and $3.5 million annual budget. 'If you remove that intervention piece, gun violence will go up again,' said Michael McKissic, who runs Mikey23, a nonprofit gun violence prevention program that trains young people in trades like construction, plumbing, and electrical work. 'We need that intervention. Our organization can't do that, other organizations can't do it. You need those individuals who are going to go in and show them the error of their ways.' The study showed that fatal shootings decreased by 19 percent more in Lansing from 2022 to 2024 than they did nationally — when gun violence was already dropping across the country post-pandemic. But the city's rate of nonfatal shootings fluctuated, ending with a 15 percent decline in 2024. Richardson said this is the kind of discrepancy that requires more analysis, but that continued research will be more difficult after the cuts from the federal government. Elam and the other authors of the study said gun violence prevention has always been an uphill battle, and hope the promising declines don't cause leaders to disengage with gun violence prevention. They also emphasized the positive feedback they've gotten from residents who say their boots-on-the-ground work has built trust, as well as city leaders, police, and the fellows themselves, most of whom are under 18 years old. 'We can talk to them,' one of the 16-year-old fellows told The Trace, referring to Advance Peace's credible messengers. 'They care about us, they're there for us.'
Yahoo
5 days ago
- Health
- Yahoo
A program that works directly with shooters in Lansing is finding success — and police support
Lansing Police| Susan J. Demas This story was published in partnership with The Trace, a nonprofit newsroom covering gun violence. The first fatal shooting of the year in Lansing, Michigan, was solved quickly. All four alleged shooters in the drive-by killing of 21-year-old Jaivion Husband on January 27 were arrested the same night. The circumstances around the men involved in the shooting were complicated; three of the four were fellows with Advance Peace, a violence intervention program that was launched in Lansing in 2022, after initial hesitation from law enforcement. The fellowship is designed to keep people who have been engaged in shootings away from situations like these through concentrated mentoring, daily communication, job opportunities, skills development, and monthly stipends. After the suspects had been arrested, Paul Elam, a criminologist at the Michigan Public Health Institute who helped bring Advance Peace to town, visited the fellows. One of them, a 19-year-old who had been with the program since the beginning, broke down in tears, telling Elam that he knew getting into the car that night was a mistake. 'He told me, 'I let you down, I should have called,'' Elam recalled. 'They let somebody influence them to hop in the car and go do something. He was able to articulate that he was changing his behavior, but he had this moment where he didn't do what he knew was right.' The tragedy reminded the leaders that a moment is all it takes. The fellows 'have so much coming at them daily,' Elam said. 'You don't know what they're being pressured to do.' In the two-plus years since Advance Peace came to Lansing, gun violence in the city has dropped by 52 percent, according to police data, and community activists, along with law enforcement, are pointing to the program's success. The program isn't perfect, some city leaders acknowledge, but it is making long-term strides to accomplish mutual violence prevention goals. Residents in Lansing said the actions taken by the police, including a focus on repeat offenders and illegal firearms, have also played an important role. To sustain the city's progress, police officers and community workers are navigating the streets carefully — cooperatively, but independently. Since its inception in 2010, Advance Peace has been effective in other cities including Richmond, CA and Rochester, NY. Unlike other national anti-violence organizations, this one doesn't focus on geographical areas, victims of shootings, or people who could potentially get involved with gun violence. Instead, their violence interrupters identify people through information from family members or others plugged in on the streets who are shooters — people often unknown to the police. Once they identify the shooters, they enroll them in an 18-month fellowship program, during which they work directly with community violence interrupters, or credible messengers, who check in on them multiple times a day. In Lansing, one interventionist works with as many as five fellows at once. 'If a shooting occurred this week, nobody's going to talk to the police, but they're going to talk to our people,' said Elam. 'The target population for us is folks who are engaged in gun violence, who are evading law enforcement and the justice system.' Throughout the mid-to-late 2010s, shootings in Lansing weren't concentrated in specific areas; gun violence was more sporadic and random, especially across the south side of the city, where 60 percent of the population lives. No particular demographic or age group was overrepresented among perpetrators or victims, a reflection of the city's relative progress in addressing the historic segregation that still dogs nearby cities like Detroit, Grand Rapids, and Kalamazoo. That all changed after COVID-19 hit and retaliatory conflicts worsened between different groups on the southwest and west sides — neighborhood beefs, escalated on social media during lockdowns, turned into shootings. Shootings in Lansing increased by 80 percent between 2019 and 2020. In 2021, the city notched the highest number of homicides ever, with 25. 'It was lawless. A lot of young men were engaging in this back-and-forth, cyclical gunfire, and you had kids dying,' said Michael Lynn, a local activist who runs The Lansing Empowerment Network and The Village Lansing, two organizations focused on addressing and providing wrap-around services to those most affected by gun violence. 'When the pandemic happened, it was like a bomb went off in the city.' Shootings in Lansing have been in decline since the peaks of 2021, similar to national trends and the result of strategic work by community groups and law enforcement after the surge in youth violence. Though the program now receives widespread praise, when Advance Peace was first introduced in 2021 as a potential option for tackling the worsening crisis, Police Chief Robert Backus said the model didn't 'sit well' with his colleagues. 'There was skepticism about how it focused on people you knew were your priority offenders,' Backus said. Marlon Beard, a credible messenger with Advance Peace, said at first 'everybody was looking at it like, 'so you guys gonna pay shooters and sponsor them to buy them guns.' I think that was just ignorance of not really sitting down to do your research.' Once law enforcement and city leadership were educated about the mechanics of the program, they became more receptive to it, Beard said. During a recent event on the Michigan State campus, a handful of fellows, along with the credible messengers, learned about financial responsibility and entrepreneurship through an exercise led by Archie Hudson, a local business owner in Lansing. On the streets, these kids are often treated as — or posture as — adults, but in this setting, as they asked inquisitive questions and answered with 'yes, sir' and 'no, sir,' their age was apparent. Some were just 13 or 14. More importantly, they were comfortable around the credible messengers and other leaders of Advance Peace, the result of a hard-won trust. 'We never involve the police. Every conflict we've had resolved doesn't involve the police,' said DeAndre McFadden, one of the credible messengers, as they're called, who is working for the program. 'They know they can't infiltrate the situation the way we can. So far, the police have respected our space and our work.' Though Advance Peace doesn't share any information with the police, a key reason the organization retains its credibility, the authorities provide Advance Peace with regular shooting data and a list of names of people they believe to be involved in gun violence. 'It's almost like we're running parallel to each other, like we both have the same goal, which is no more violent incidents,' Chief Backus said, noting that the priority of police is enforcement and accountability. 'We have an obligation to represent victims, and if someone is our suspect, we have an obligation to put that person in front of a judge.' Despite the success of recent efforts, distrust between residents and the Police Department persists. That distrust stems from a decade of police shootings in and around Lansing, and a lack of transparency from the department on how the investigations progress, community leaders said. Since 2020, there have been four officer-involved shootings in Lansing, which has a population of roughly 112,000, and all of the cases were deemed 'justifiable.' By comparison, in the 10 years before 2020, there were four. In the most recent case, in December 2023, officers shot and killed Stephen Romero, a Hispanic man, after they were called for a domestic dispute. 'How can we create real positive relations when all of this is consistently going on,' asked Lynn, the local activist. Backus acknowledged that police shootings erode progress, and since they've happened more frequently since 2020, it's been difficult to rebuild trust. 'When they're happening so often in a short time, it doesn't give us time to repair those relationships,' he said, adding that unsolved homicides and people's unwillingness to speak to the police also hurt officers' credibility in the community. 'Ain't nothing changed,' said Beard, the Advance Peace worker, referring to the tense relationship between the community and law enforcement. 'The same way we get looked at as Black men — because one Black man did something, we all did it — that's kind of how we view the police.' One of the fellows with the program said if the police ever tried to talk to him, he'd 'just walk away and not say anything.' Over the last few years, the department has tried to put more emphasis on developing trust in the community by hosting more events, getting in front of active local groups, and being more visible in struggling areas. It has also focused more on firearms access. But the road to strategic cooperation is long. That's why activists, residents, and police agree that Advance Peace is crucial. A recent study of the program revealed some promising data, showing that over 90 percent of the fellows no longer use guns to resolve their conflicts. Yet just as the program is beginning to show its worth, the city is in jeopardy of losing it, as it's funded in large part by community violence interruption grants from the federal government that were terminated in April by the Department of Justice, leaving cities like Lansing scrambling for alternative funding sources. Some groups have joined a lawsuit against the Trump administration to restore the funding. DeVone Boggan, who is originally from Lansing and founded Advance Peace in Oakland, California, in 2010, said the recent funding issues are another example of why local cities and counties need to include funding for community violence intervention work in their fiscal budgets. 'That local infrastructure must budget for CVI practices,' Boggan said. 'That's the only way to sustain the work.'
Yahoo
16-05-2025
- Health
- Yahoo
New research links gun violence exposure to higher rates of depression and suicidal ideation
For decades, politicians and gun lobbying organizations have perpetuated the notion that mental health issues drive mass violence. A new study is challenging that narrative, though, showing that, rather than causing acts of violence, exposure to gun violence increased rates of depression among respondents and led to higher use of mental health services, The Trace reports. The study, led by researchers at the New Jersey Gun Violence Research Center, surveyed 8,009 respondents across the country, assessing both their exposure to gun violence and their mental health over time. It found that a greater frequency of gun violence exposure was associated with higher depression scores, greater odds of mental health service use, and, perhaps most significantly, greater odds of suicidal ideation compared to having no exposure. It's the first time, using a national representative survey, that researchers have found a correlation between people exposed to gun violence and higher rates of suicidal ideation. The research is an integral step in what experts call a public health approach to gun violence, helping to lay out the empirical foundation for future prevention efforts. "Until we understand the true scope of what gun violence means for our health and our well-being … we are not going to tackle it in a way that fully addresses the issue with all the resources required," said Daniel Semenza, director of research at the center and the lead author of the study. The study, published in the journal Social Science and Medicine in February, found that 40 percent of the respondents had heard gunshots multiple times in their lives. Another 12 percent had cumulative exposure, meaning they were exposed to five or more forms of gun violence, including witnessing a shooting or being threatened with a gun, in their lifetimes. Exposure to firearm suicide more than once and being shot multiple times were found to be associated with increased depression and suicide risks. This recent analysis expands on Semenza's study from last year that found that preparation for a suicide attempt was nearly four times higher among Black Americans who had been shot. "This study is vital to be able to talk about what gun violence does to the mental health of America as a whole, and what it means for our collective well-being," Semenza said. "But the conversation doesn't have to stop there. Exposure to gun violence is fundamentally unequal, and it impacts those who are most marginalized throughout the country." The recent findings hit close to home for Aswad Thomas, a gun violence survivor and the vice president of the Alliance for Safety and Justice, a national organization that provides resources to trauma recovery centers, specialized facilities that support victims of crime. "When I got shot, I remember during the discharge process that my doctors and nurses told me about the physical challenges, but they never mentioned anything about the psychological effects," Thomas said. "I've lost about 40 friends to gun violence throughout my life, and the topic as it relates to 'how do we heal and cope' has just been nonexistent." Research has consistently found that people suffering from severe mental health issues are more likely to be victims of gun violence rather than perpetrators. A 10-year study in San Francisco showed the primary need for gun violence victims was mental health services, and hospital violence intervention program screening in Philadelphia found 75 percent of participants suffered from post-traumatic stress disorder. Experts working in those care settings have long reported on the effects of interpersonal violence on marginalized communities, but continue to face financial challenges in sustaining their research. "We are seeing the highest rates of suicide among Black adolescents that we've ever seen," said Fatimah Loren Dreier, the executive director of the Health Alliance for Violence Intervention, a national organization of hospital-based violence intervention programs. "This study may unlock some of the mechanisms that are making that so, given the increased concentration of violence in communities of color and the distress that comes from that exposure." Semenza said the study expands on the groundwork that programs like the trauma recovery centers have sustained by highlighting the connection between mental health services and gun violence victims. This support, through mechanisms like grief counseling, transportation, and financial assistance, is the core of the work trauma recovery centers do to help those affected by gun violence, Thomas noted. "It's not that most people, especially survivors, don't want to get mental health services, but it's really an issue about access," Thomas said. "There needs to be more public understanding of these issues, and there needs to be more investments into those type of program services, like the trauma recovery model." This story was produced by The Trace and reviewed and distributed by Stacker.
Yahoo
30-04-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Cleveland activists say gun violence prevention efforts are disjointed — but there's a fix
CLEVELAND, OH - APRIL 8 2025 - Since President Trump eliminated the White House Office of Gun Violence Prevention, many states are trying to create their own. However, they're noticeably absent throughout the Midwest. Local community leaders in Cleveland have called on the city to create an office of gun violence prevention, stating that a permanent investment in an office would make their work more effective. (Photo by Daniel Lozada for The Trace) This story was published in partnership with The Trace, a nonprofit newsroom covering gun violence. In February, 10-year-old Lorenzo Roberson, dressed in a suit and tie, spoke passionately at a town hall meeting in Cleveland. He was there to address city leaders about how he and other kids feel about safety in their neighborhoods. Most importantly, though, he was there to remember his best friend, Kaden Coleman, who was shot and killed that same month as he sat in the backseat of a car in Mount Pleasant, eight miles south of downtown Cleveland. 'I am Kaden because his spirit now lives within me. I am Kaden because I am 10 years old, too; I get good grades, too,' Lorenzo told a mix of residents and elected officials. 'Will I have a chance to survive? Will my life be cut short, too?' Then he posed a challenge to the audience: 'Will the adults in this room make sure that I have a chance to grow?' His call for safety in the face of rising shooting rates among young people reflects the pervasive fear among people who live in Cleveland's most turbulent neighborhoods, including Mount Pleasant, where Lorenzo lives. Despite a recent decline in shootings across the city, a handful of neighborhoods — Central, East Cleveland, Mount Pleasant and others — experience disproportionate levels of violence. Homicide rates in those areas range from 25 to 57 per 100,000 residents compared to places that are as low as 0 to 15. All of the struggling neighborhoods are majority Black. To combat the burden of shootings on those communities, local leaders and activists have worked hard for decades to fill gaps, establishing intervention and prevention programs, doing outreach work among young people, and providing mental health support to those in need. Those methods seem to have contributed to the city's overall decline, especially in the last few years. But people working to tackle gun crimes in Cleveland said local groups have fallen into silos as they each vie for funding, creating a competitive, uncoordinated response that they see as inadequate for addressing the shifting crisis. A localized Office of Gun Violence Prevention, they said, would help address that isolation — and curb shootings. 'We've seen how successful (these types of offices) have been in other cities. I think it would make a real difference,' said Laron Douglas, the executive director of Renounce Denounce, a community-based gang intervention program that works with kids in Cleveland. Many cities across the country have created offices of gun violence prevention over the past several years. They coordinate local initiatives, fund programs, and help drive policy changes. Since President Donald Trump eliminated the White House Office of Gun Violence Prevention in his first month in office, dozens of municipalities are proposing or creating their own, but local offices are notably scarce throughout the Midwest, where gun violence rates are higher than in some of the country's largest cities. Several states in the region, including Michigan, Pennsylvania, Illinois, and Wisconsin, have successfully established them; Allegheny County, where Pittsburgh is located, is one of the few counties to host one. 'Having one dedicated gun violence prevention office will make us more intentional. The office would be able to call a family and deploy resources effectively,' said Myesha Watkins, who runs the Cleveland Peacemakers Alliance, an anti-violence group established in 2009 among a handful of still-active community groups. 'There's too many people who don't know where to go for gun violence prevention.' SUBSCRIBE: GET THE MORNING HEADLINES DELIVERED TO YOUR INBOX The city has a variety of official violence prevention strategies, including the Neighborhood Safety Fund to invest in community violence prevention work; Cleveland Thrive, the city's community-based violence intervention coalition; and the Mayor's Office of Prevention, Intervention, and Opportunity, one of several offices addressing root causes of youth violence under the mayor's 'all-of-government' approach. Cleveland has also deployed a street outreach team from the Community Relations Board to do violence intervention work, and the Neighborhood Resources and Recreational Centers are involved with providing activity space for kids. Those efforts are helpful, but they're not strategic enough, said City Council Member Richard Starr, who is a native of Central and represents several neighborhoods struggling with gun violence. 'They don't have a plan right now,' Starr said, noting the city's handful of initiatives but lack of a concrete plan for tackling gun violence or measuring its trajectory. According to city data, Cleveland had a firearm death rate of 45 per 100,000 residents in 2023, the most recent year full data is available, an increase from 39 in 2022. In 2024, homicides declined to 113, from 156 in 2023, according to data from the city's police department. Still, residents warn that the data doesn't tell the full story. Data is 'either going to create chaos or it's going to create hope, and depending on the narrative, it can do either or it can do both,' Watkins said. 'If we're talking about our community members, they'll see a post that homicides are down, but they're not feeling that when they walk outside their homes.' Local leaders say the encouraging numbers shouldn't dissuade engaged citizens from creating an office of violence prevention, especially when considering the areas most affected. Michael Houser, the Cuyahoga County Council Member for District 10, which includes some of Cleveland's most gun violence-plagued neighborhoods, including East Cleveland, Cleveland Heights, and St. Clair Superior, has been pushing the county to build an office of violence prevention since his election last year, and hopes to work in partnership with Starr at the city-level to create one. The County Council is in talks to create one, but the question is how they're going to fund it. 'We find money to fund everything else,' Houser said. 'So hopefully we will be able to find the funding for this very important initiative.' In Cleveland, Council Member Starr led the effort to declare gun violence a public health crisis, legislation which passed in the city council yesterday. Starr will now be able to use state and federal resources to fund an office. 'You look at some of these other cities, they have plans and investment in how they're going to curb violence. Cleveland is behind on that,' Starr said, pointing to Columbus, one of the few Midwest cities to have such an office. Since its municipal office was created in 2023, Columbus has achieved what Starr and others hope to. They've taken a public health approach to gun violence, helped coordinate and strategize violence reduction programming between different local groups, and begun to measure and assess their progress (a report is coming in the next few months). 'Columbus is flooded with (violence intervention groups) and we needed a way to streamline these groups to make sure they're most effective and have access to funding,' said Rena Shak, the executive director of the Office of Violence Prevention in Columbus. That sort of strategizing is exactly what people want to see in Cleveland. 'We have individuals and we have groups doing great work, but we need to find a way to bring people together,' said Michelle Bell, founder of M-PAC Cleveland, which provides resources to families and friends who've lost loved ones to gun violence. Bell remembers feeling like there was nowhere to turn after her son was shot and killed in 2019. 'If people are saying we need this office, our officials and local leaders need to listen.' SUPPORT: YOU MAKE OUR WORK POSSIBLE
Yahoo
23-04-2025
- Yahoo
In Cleveland, shootings drop but kids are at higher risk
Kids participate in an after school program with Beat the Streets, a nonprofit that works to positively alter life's trajectory for K-12 student-athletes in the Cleveland area by giving them access to youth development, mentoring, and wrestling. (Photo by Daniel Lozada for The Trace.) This story was published in partnership with The Trace, a nonprofit newsroom covering gun violence. High school students were reading, studying, and hanging out on a Tuesday afternoon at the Shaker Heights Public Library, just seven miles east of downtown Cleveland, when a confrontation broke out between two teenagers. It started with pushes and shoves, but then one of them pulled out a gun and started shooting. In the end, 18-year-old Charles Lee Shanklin was killed, and a 15-year-old was arrested on several charges, including carrying a concealed weapon and murder. Since 2021, shooting and homicide numbers have declined throughout Cleveland, in keeping with national trends. Children and teenagers, however, are still bearing the burden of firearm injuries and deaths in Cuyahoga County, where Cleveland is located. Since 2010, shooting deaths among people 18 and younger have more than tripled in Cuyahoga, rising to 37 in 2023, the latest year for which data is available. The youth firearm homicide rate is more than 30% higher in Cuyahoga than it is in three comparable counties — Allegheny County, in Pennsylvania; Franklin County, Ohio; and Wayne County, Michigan, which includes Detroit. From 2020 to 2023, according to The Trace's analysis of census data and statistics from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), Cuyahoga's youth firearm death rate averaged to 17 per 100,000 residents, including a six-point jump between 2019 and 2020. A report by the Cuyahoga County Board of Health found that overall child fatalities in 2023 reached a five-year high, and 19% of them were by firearm. Last year, 41 people under 18 in the county were charged with homicide, which matched the record set in 2023. SUBSCRIBE: GET THE MORNING HEADLINES DELIVERED TO YOUR INBOX Cleveland, which is the largest city in the county, is responsible for around 75% of all homicides countywide, and a gun is used in over 80% of them. 'Every week it seems like someone I know gets killed,' said Delano Griffin, a 17-year-old resident of East Cleveland. 'You just never feel safe.' Like other midwestern cities, downtown Cleveland is separated by just a few miles from the historically redlined and neglected neighborhoods surrounding the metropolitan area, like East Cleveland, Garfield Heights, St. Clair Superior, and Central. Police data shows those neighborhoods struggle the most with gun violence. All of them are predominantly Black. The vast majority of gun deaths in Cleveland are among Black men. Cleveland's Black population is 47% — yet its Black residents make up nearly 85% of all gunshot victims. Local activists said pinpointing a single reason for the higher rates of shootings among young people is difficult, but they said poverty plays a major role. Myesha Watkins, who runs the Cleveland Peacemakers Alliance, a community-led violence prevention and intervention group that focuses on children and teens, said the economic hardship young people experience can make them feel their lives are out of their own control. They can feel they have no choice but to get involved in street activity, and might even pick up a gun 'A lot of the actions and the choices they're making are because of the unmet needs of somebody that's caring for them,' Watkins said. According to U.S. Census estimates, Cleveland has the single highest child poverty rate of any U.S. city with a population of more than 300,000, at 45%. Demetrius Williams, who runs Beat The Streets Cleveland, a nonprofit program that gives young people access to mentoring, youth development, and wrestling, said that the peer pressure is heavy. 'A lot of times they come from these type of environments, and everybody in your neighborhood is doing it, everybody that you been surrounded by is doing it,' Williams said. 'Once they're caught up in it, that's it.' Local activists point to other issues, like accessibility to resources, mental health services, and job training, combined with a lack of dependable financial investment from the city. 'Young people who are already on the cusp of being involved in violence are living in a system that hasn't been set up for them to succeed,' said Sonya Pryor-Jones, who runs the Office of Prevention, Intervention and Opportunity for Youth and Young Adults in the Mayor's Office. In 2023, Cleveland Mayor Justin Bibb announced the Neighborhood Safety Fund, which allocated $10 million in grant money from American Rescue Plan Act funds to invest in violence prevention. From it, 44 different groups have so far received an average of $46,000 each, totaling roughly $2 million. The year before, the city was awarded a $2 million grant from the U.S. Department of Justice for the creation of Cleveland Thrive, a community violence intervention coalition meant to bring groups together and build a strategy to reduce gun violence. It's led to some collaboration, including a gun violence training program, but activists say it hasn't been enough. 'We have to get the right resources to these areas. We cannot expect everything to change if we're giving limited resources to people who need it the most,' said Richard Starr, a City Council member who represents several neighborhoods stricken by gun violence, including Central. He's leading an effort to establish gun violence as a public health crisis in Cleveland, which would enable the federal Department of Health and Human Services to help fund a centralized Office of Violence Prevention. Local community organizations are appreciative of the existing funding, but 'the biggest thing is getting consistent money, and a lot of groups that are working with these kids are not getting it consistently,' Williams said. That instability has them all vying for the same bucket of dollars, part of the reason many community organizations are doing their gun violence prevention work in silos — and struggling to sustain their efforts. 'Collectively, if we come together and share resources and share language and share data, we can do a lot more and cover a lot more,' Watkins said. More importantly, though, the infighting projects a lack of legitimacy to young people who are faced with picking up a gun. 'The youth are not dumb, when they see us beefing within ourselves, it's a problem,' Williams said. Delano Griffin, the 17-year-old who lives in Garfield Heights, said he appreciates anyone from his area stepping up to help the kids — but he hadn't heard of most of the community programs that exist specifically for him. If they want to address gun deaths, Griffin said the decision-makers downtown need to do a better job of reaching out. 'They shouldn't forget about us,' he said. 'We live in this city, too.' SUPPORT: YOU MAKE OUR WORK POSSIBLE
