#InstituteforNonviolenceChicago

[scy-chicago]

Warriors in the War to End Violence in Chicago

In this week’s blog, SCY Community Programs Coordinator Ed Boone focuses his blog on a number of individuals and organizations who are contributing to ending the violence in the city of Chicago.

Chicago experienced over 750 murders in 2016—the most since 1997. So I thought it would be great to highlight some of the brave individuals and organizations who are not just sitting back waiting on the next newscast of a murder to show up on their television set before going out to get involved, but who are hitting the streets now reaching out to possible future perpetrators, engaging youth in their communities before gangs do, and encouraging adults to also become involved in the fight to end the violence. Violence comes in many forms and combating it will take many different approaches on many different fronts such as on the basketball court, in the classroom, at a park or community center, and on the streets where you will find lots of youth with nothing but idle time on their hands.

What’s the motivating factor that propels someone to confront the seemingly never ending cycle of violence in our city? My thoughts are that the reasons include:

A friend or family member was the victim of violence, and now they feel compelled to get involved

They want their community to be safe not only for them but for the many children that live there

They feel the police and elected officials can’t solve the problem alone and need the help of everyone including them.  

In order to get a true answer to my question I asked several individuals who are on the front lines, what is it that propels them to confront the violence in our city?  No matter what their reasoning is, I myself am truly grateful and appreciative of their efforts because the war on violence needs every solider that makes him or herself available.

I’ll begin by focusing on Chicago Survivors and its staff, who are always there when an act of violence has place. Chicago Survivors grew out of a personal tragedy when an aspiring young man, Francisco Valencia, lost his life to violence in 2009, and his mother Joy McCormack began to address the needs of other families who had experienced trauma as a result of losing a loved one. The organization provides support to victims’ families by offering crisis intervention services at the crime scene, hospital, police station, medical examiner’s office, and funeral home, as well as supportive counseling, case management and referrals for at least six months. That support could be assisting to maneuver through any paper work, organizing a memorial vigil, court advocacy and much more. One face of the organization you may recognize from television newscasts is that of Dawn Valenti, a crisis responder with Chicago Survivors.

I asked Dawn during a phone interview “What drives you to do this type of work?” Her response was, “It’s the love I have for our city, and being able to provide families with the support and answers to their questions like ’why is my son still in the car, why is he still laid out on the ground,’ and being able to tell them why.” Dawn’s work involves being there at the hospital with family members when they’re being told “you can’t see your loved one now” and telling them why, or talking to the hospital staff to say “hey, she just lost her son—is it possible for her to see him?” and helping them obtain any information they may need. Dawn says that she wishes she could stop doing this work, and if she lost her job because there were no more murders in the city, that would be okay with her. Through her work, Dawn believes she has been able to prevent further violence from taking place. She mentioned a time when someone was killed, his brother who had started drinking alcohol was ready to retaliate, and his friends were gathering on a nearby corner—“I told him ‘look that’s not the way to go,’ and he listened.” Chicago Survivors holds monthly Family Survivor Unsolved Case Meetings with the families of homicide victims and police brass from each Police Area to get updates on the status of unsolved cases. This follow-up goes a long way in assisting family members deal with the trauma associated with losing a loved one. Dawn can be reached at Dawn@Chicagosurvivors.org or 312-488-9222.

Dawn Valenti of the Chicago Survivors

Vince Carter is the Executive Director of Project Education Plus, a program which aligns education and basketball together to develop and strengthen the skills of young people interested in the sport. He is also a former CPS teacher who taught at Walt Disney Elementary where a teacher’s school strike led to him and others forming a basketball team to keep kids engaged during the strike. The basketball arm of the program is centered on the Chicago Demons, the team name of a number of teams ranging from grades K-12. I first met Vince in 1980 when I was coaching basketball in the Cabrini Green community where Vince would bring one of his many traveling teams into the Olivet gymnasium, a local community center where tournaments were held. Vince says that Project Education Plus started out teaching organized basketball skills, and as many of the young men expressed a desire to play ball in high school and college, the need for educational skills and preparation came into existence. Since 1980, the Chicago Demons have assisted in sending over 260 young men and women off to college, including one NBA player (Tony Allen, Memphis Grizzlies), and several players who played in this year’s NCAA basketball tournament. When asked what motivates him to keep working with youth, Vince proudly says “the next group of kids coming in.” He also says that he misses teaching but not the getting up in the mornings. The Chicago Demons host tryouts twice a year for those interested in participating in their program. Contact Vince at pepdemons@aol.com or 312.520-0950.

Vince Carter, Executive Director of Project Education Plus / Chicago Demons

I met our next warrior in the war to end violence while attending meetings in the Humboldt Park community. Max Cerda was working back in the community he grew up in and where he was involved in a ‘street organization’ (gang). Max now works as a Street Intervention Specialist, with BUILD Chicago (Broader Urban Involvement & Leadership Development). BUILD Chicago specializes in gang intervention, prevention and youth programs for nearly 3,000 teens in the Chicagoland area. It’s also where for the last four years Max has crafted his skills as an intervention specialist reaching back to help those living the life he once led to be inspired to become more productive individuals. When I say Max has lived the life, I say it because at the age of 16 he had a sibling die in his arms, from a bullet that was meant for him. After serving some time in prison where he formed a prison inmate committee that focused on education, Max worked as an outreach worker with the Aspira organization and as a CeaseFire Interrupter. Through his work with youth, Max has served as a mentor to many youth and deescalated potentially violent situations from occurring. Max can be reached at maxcerda@buildchicago.org or 773.495-1811.

BUILD Chicago Street Intervention Specialist Max Cerda

In Chicago there are a large number of women who act as warriors in the war to end violence in our city, the numbers are so great that each day I cross paths with at least one or more who are reaching back to save lives and make communities safe. I had the pleasure of working with one of these warriors during my tenure at Cure Violence formally called CeaseFire where I served as an outreach worker.

Marilyn Pitchford who currently works as a non-violence Program Manager with Non-violence Chicago started off as a volunteer for Bethel New Life on the West side. When Bethel New Life received a contract to host a Cure Violence site, a manager there said that a woman was needed to work on the project and Marilyn was tapped for the position. It turned out to be a great selection as Marilyn went on to build relationships with a number of street organizations and individuals. Those relationships allowed her and her staff to intervene in conflicts, gain knowledge of possible retaliatory shootings, stop them before they happened, and broker peace among those groups. Marilyn currently oversees a staff of seven outreach workers who themselves were at one time involved in street organizations or served time in prison.

Marilyn Pitchford of the Non-violence Chicago

Marilyn has gained the respect of many young men and women on the city’s West side, a respect I have seen firsthand that many men don’t get. I asked Marilyn “what drives you to do what you do?” She stated “I have a mission that is bigger than me, to help deal with the ills in our city. I lost a brother to those ills and look at myself as a big sister to the people I work with.” I asked Marilyn about the respect she gets from those involved in street organizations, to which she replied ”I give respect to gain it, they trust and know I care about them.” Marilyn stated she has tried to get out of violence prevention but it keeps pulling her back in. She further states that there is no easy fix to end the violence, but that one solution is to provide the same resources allocated to other communities to poor communities.

As mentioned earlier sometimes losing a loved one to violence will in itself drive a person to become a warrior in the war to end violence. Such is the case of our next warrior Pam Bosley. On April 4, 2006, she lost one of her three sons Terrell Bosley at the tender age of 18, to violence after he was killed on the grounds of a local church. Right away Pam wanted to do in her words “something to prevent other parents from having to go through what I went through because when this tragedy happened to me,   there was no group around to help me.” So she began reaching out to local officials, and local church pastors for assistance but never received it. Then one day after seeing Father Pfleger of St. Sabina Church on television she reached out to him and he provided guidance in addition to connecting her to other parents who were experiencing the same pain as her. Since that time she has partnered with other parents who have lost children to violence and formed their own violence prevention organization called Purpose Over Pain Through Pam’s personal experience and her current work as a Violence Prevention Manager at the Ark-of-Saint-Sabina she has become an advocate pushing for common sense gun laws, provides support to parents, and assists with the Safe Saturday Night Basketball Tournaments hosted by Purpose Over Pain .  Pam feels that not enough is being done to follow up and solve the many murder cases on the books at the CPD, adding that her son’s case is still unsolved. She has two remaining sons, ages 18 and 23, one of whom spoke in Washington D.C. during a Town Hall Meeting to then President Barack Obama concerning the violence in Chicago. Pam Bosley can be contacted at pbosley@thearkofstsabina.org or 773.236-8980 Webpage Ark-of-Saint-Sabina

Pam Bosley

During the last couple of years there have been a lot of protests against actions by police, and groups like Black Lives Matter have come out to demand justice for those killed by police. In response to those demands and protests I have heard people say on more than one occasion “why don’t people do something about the killings in communities by black on black crime, why aren’t people protesting against that?” My answer is people are out there doing something about it in their own way. Some believe in protest, and some believe in engagement and involvement. As you can see there are many unsung heroes in the war to end the violence in our city, warriors made up of individuals and organizations fighting to make a different in their communities, and while some worry about the violence in the city, others are doing something about it.

The question is will you be a #warrior or a worrier?

[thezumbasisters]

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[baldheadphillips]

This one dude I respect as a entertainer as a man and a father @bodealbsm we out here trying to show these young brothers it��s a mother way from the Westside to Englewood much love bro I’m with you bro no matter what 💯❗️#cureviolence #bookbsldheadnow #bodeal #comedyoverdepression @institutefornonviolencechicago (at Institute for Nonviolence Chicago)