Philadelphia’s gun violence epidemic has claimed the lives of more than 400 people in 2021, reported WHYY-FM.
The city recorded its 400th homicide on Saturday — the
highest number at this time of year in more than a decade, according to police
data.
The city reached the grim milestone despite a
slight dip in shootings between mid-July and mid-August and much-touted state
and city grants awarded to grassroots community organizations working
to stop mostly young people from picking up guns in the first place.
Among Philadelphians doing violence prevention work — offering
recreation space, giving away gun locks, connecting
people to jobs — the fear is that the shootings in the city will only
continue to rise before they decline. They say they could help be the “boots on
the ground,” if only they got the help they need.
“[Officials] just need to put the people who are already on
the streets, who already made the connection with people on the streets, and
follow their lead,” said Rosalind Pichardo, a longtime Kensington activist, who
is fighting the shootings and illegal drug crisis in her backyard.
“I mean, you can’t combat gun violence sitting behind a
desk,” she said.
Drugs and shootings are so intertwined in Kensington,
Pichardo has made
it her mission to deliver what she calls “community kits” that come
with the opiate reversal drug Narcan, gun locks, and a tourniquet.
According to Pichardo, the costs of her kits are manageable,
but it would help to have people on street corners helping her distribute them.
She said she hasn’t applied for any grants because the strings attached tend to
restrict what she can do, such as distributing Narcan.
Leaders of organizations that have been awarded state
funding to combat violence say they haven’t seen it yet.
At the start of September, State Sen. Vincent Hughes
announced that the Pennsylvania Commission on Crime and Delinquency awarded $5
million in gun violence reduction grants to Philadelphia and other parts of the
commonwealth seeing a rise in violence.
Well-known groups like the New Options More Opportunities
(NOMO) Foundation and Every Murder is Real (EMIR) Healing Center were tapped to
receive more than $224,000 each.
According to Gov. Tom Wolf’s May announcement encouraging
organizations to apply, the goal was to have the projects begin by Oct. 1.
But, just days before that deadline, NOMO CEO and Executive
Director Rickey Duncan said it’s still unclear when that money will be
available. Whats more, the sum awarded to NOMO is spread over three years and on
a reimbursement basis.
“The city, the government, the state, and the federal
government need to come together, find a way where they can enrich these
boots-on-the-ground organizations with its hands-on money,” said Duncan. “A lot
of these organizations are going to go borrow money to spend the money, just to
get the money.”
On Sunday, Philadelphia Mayor Jim Kenney took to Twitter to say he was “heartbroken and outraged that we’ve lost more than 400 Philadelphians to preventable violence this year.”
In his message, he asked residents to share any information
they had regarding crime with police so authorities could continue taking
illegal firearms off the streets. Kenney also said more violence prevention
grants were slated to be announced this week.
Grassroots organizations, however, have described
the process of applying for these funds as cumbersome.
Still, Duncan doesn’t put the entire weight of the gun
violence epidemic on city and state officials. He bemoans the loss of “the
village” needed to raise children. To Duncan, shaping a safer Philadelphia will
require help from the businesses headquartered here, as well as celebrities
with city ties.
“We need everybody to step up,” said Duncan. “I’m tired of
us just saying, what is the mayor going to do? What is the police going to do?
What are we going to do as a community?”
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