Stimulus, Neighborhoods and Schools

A couple of recent news items from the Chicago Public schools related to stimulus spending have caught my attention. First, today's hot CPS story is the announcement of details about the district's $30 million, stimulus-funded plan to reduce youth violence. WBEZ's Linda Lutton did a good overall piece on it, which you can read or listen to here. Back in September when the plan was first announced, Englewood pastors loudly complained about a Philadelphia-based agency taking on the task of, and the pay for, working with at-risk youth. For the next five months, the district's chief executive officer, Ron Huberman, zipped his lip about the plan.

According to the Catalyst Notebook blog, Huberman unzipped his lip at a press conference at Englewood's Robeson High School yesterday just enough to let us know that the work with high-risk youth will now be split among community agencies, plus the Philadelphia group, Youth Advocate Programs. Looks to me like the pastors' voices were heard. The Philadelphia group will be paid to work with the 250 highest-risk students, while community agencies will be hired to work with another 2000 students. The two efforts will eat up $10 million, or one-third of the total funds available. Another $2 million will go toward community patrols to ensure students have safe passage to and from school, like the effort Huberman helped kickstart last March in Little Village, which I wrote about here.

I certainly hope this will be an opportunity for NCP neighborhoods with strong antiviolence work in place, like Little Village and Auburn Gresham, to put more gas in their tanks, as well as helping other neighborhoods plant new efforts or help their seedling projects grow.

Second, last week Mayor Daley and the district announced significant new bonds for school construction made possible through stimulus. According to the press release, CPS used approximately $22 million for emergency repairs at Bond, Caldwell, Ebinger, Harlan, Gallistel, Schneider, Sumner and Yale schools, plus $7 million to renovate four CPS turnaround schools: Bethune, Dulles, Fenger, and Johnson. While urgent repairs are key in an underfunded system with decades of deferred maintenance, and turning around a school ought to include needed repairs, only one of these schools (Ebinger) is on the heavily overcrowded Northwest Side. And none of the early spending addresses the long-neglected problem of overcrowded schools on the Southwest Side. (Full disclosure: I'm a Southwest Sider, though I don't live in the bull's-eye of the overcrowding zone.) Back in 2005 a colleague and I analyzed where the kids were and where CPS capital dollars went; the numbers didn't match up well. You can read our analysis here.

Back then, the district cried poor, saying there was no money left to address overcrowding. Well, there's new money now. Unfortunately, there's a lot of new faces in district leadership, which means new priorities and lost institutional memory. Let's hope some of it gets spent this time on longstanding overcrowding in places like Chicago Lawn, Gage Park and Brighton Park. Jimmy Dispensa (head of demographics for CPS), can you put a bug in Ron's ear on this?

A Couple Links

I thought these unrelated links would be of some interest to the Community Beat community:

* National syndicated columnist Neal Peirce of Washington Post Writers Group covered innovative methods to combat youth violence, with a nod toward Chicago's CeaseFire program. http://citiwire.net/post/1480/

* The MacArthur Foundation has posted a video of Adolfo Carrion, urban affairs director for the Obama White House, giving an address to LISC/Chicago's recent "Chicago Rising" gathering. http://www.macfound.org/site/c.lkLXJ8MQKrH/b.4284677/apps/s/content.asp?ct=7655857&utm_source=pubaff&utm_medium=email&utm_content=enews&utm_campaign=nov09_enews&tr=y&auid=5623653

Youth Noise: B-Ball on the Block Is Back

Got an email from Cesar Nuñez this morning turning me on to a $500 fundraising challenge for Beyond the Ball, the group that's using basketball and soccer to bring youth onto the streets on Friday evenings in Little Village and North Lawndale.

BBall on the Block has been going for three years now and it's great to see that they're still innovating – adding soccer, for instance – and that they've connected with Youth Noise and Nike on this fundraiser. They need another 32,600 clicks to get that $500, and you can click all you want, so get on over there and help make it happen.

Trina Chiasson, Chicago blogger for Youth Noise Play City, caught some great quotes in that video above. Here's one of them:

"I grew up in this neighborhood, I've seen a lot of violence and poor choices," says Ken Alvarado, soccer director. "And then just getting older, you see that there aren't that many opportunities to escape those places."

BBall on the Block provides that opportunity: "You know you're safe, you know there is nothing to worry about, we have food, you have nice people working here too, so it's just a blessing for the community. And I'm definitely taking it as a blessing for myself as well."

In Little Village, Rapid Response to a Shooting

I've heard a lot over the years about how CeaseFire uses its street networks to mount rapid responses to violence to help minimize or even prevent further incidents and retaliations. Below is a close-up look at how it actually gets done.

This is an excerpt from an email sent today by Michael Rodríguez, the violence prevention director at Enlace Chicago (formerly Little Village Community Development Corporation).

"On Wednesday of last week just before 2:30 p.m., three of our Enlace-CeaseFire staff were in the New Life Church van driven by our Enlace-Safety Net Works staff member. They were on the way to drop a young person off and head to a Community Schools cookout at Eli Whitney school, with all the cookout materials in the rear of the van.

"As they were heading west on 26th Street they witnessed a young man who had been shot lying on the ground. They jumped to action and took the young man, shot twice in the arm and the stomach, to Mt. Sinai Hospital where he was treated in their trauma unit and underwent surgery immediately. Just a few hours later, while at the Eli Whitney cookout, we heard five retaliatory gun shots. The shooting occurred on Harding and 31st with two young men shot in the leg.

"In response to these shootings, Enlace-CeaseFire Little Village organized a rally where about 150 members of the community, friends from other CeaseFire locations, and members of the Violence Prevention Collaborative came together in prayer for peace. I just learned that also in attendance was the young man shot on 26th and Central Park.

"We would like to thank the following organizations for contributing on the day:

• New Life Church
• YMCA Street Intervention Program
• Alderman Ricardo Muñoz (22nd Ward)
• CeaseFire Brighton Park, Humboldt Park, Lawndale and other areas
• SER, Jobs for Progress
• Beyond the Ball
• Little Village Environmental Justice Organization
• Enlace Chicago CeaseFire, Safety Net Works, and other staff

"Rep. Mendoza sent her well wishes while she was in Springfield. Also 10th District Commander Ruiz called yesterday to thank us for our efforts. During an Enlace CeaseFire meeting yesterday we recommitted to increasing our efforts in the area to Stop the Shootings, Stop the Killings; please be on the lookout for future actions and please remember to refer to us the most troubled youth for mentorship.

"One last thought is that these things happen very quickly and word does not get out as fast as we would like. For a few of you this might be the first time hearing about this. We will be setting up a mass text list to assist in getting word out quickly in addition to our email efforts.

"Also, one last pitch ;) CeaseFire is not in the state budget currently. If you plan on being in Springfield , or have a call planned already, or now have something to call about, please urge legislators (particularly in the Senate) to support HB 4431 introduced by Yarbrough and Mendoza, which would fund CeaseFire . . . Please call Senator John Cullerton, (217) 782-2728, and your home district senator."

So there you have it: the brutal, heartbreaking and sometimes exhilarating work of building safer communities. My hat is off to those involved in the day-to-day struggle.

Urban Prep boys representing Chicago well

The Tribune's Dawn Turner Trice writes this morning that the bus trip to Washington by 22 young men from Urban Prep Academies, 6201 S. Stewart in Englewood, is going well. People are "moved by how put-together they are," she reports.

We've written a lot here about the need for youth programming and schooling that lets kids rise above the dangers and low expectations of their neighborhoods. It seems these kids are doing that:

"As impressive as Urban Prep's students look, their clothing doesn't begin to complete their stories. Many come from low-income, single-parent homes and live in the tough community of Englewood, where education isn't always the priority.

Some of these guys have to carry their clothes to school and change there rather than endure the harassment of peers who are street toughs.

"You do what you have to do," Alfonso Henderson, 15, said during the interfaith breakfast. "Englewood can be rough at times, but not all the time. You have to know when to go out and when to stay inside. You have to know who you're going to be."

My hat is off to the school, the students and to Turner Trice for capturing the story.

Photo above by the Tribune's Nancy Stone.

Three more shot dead; something isn't working

I have a well-practiced line about urban violence that goes something like this: a healthy community, one that truly engages its youth in positive activities and that has a solid network of job and training opportunities for adults, that community will be able to reduce the brutal street killings that mark a less-healthy place, a place where people are angry and lack any real hope for their own future.

But with the gun violence continuing every day in the very neighborhoods where we work to build those healthier systems, I'm having trouble getting those words out of my mouth.

On Monday and Tuesday, a man was killed and a teenager injured in a Southeast Side shooting; a 28-year-old died after being shot in West Humboldt Park; and another man, 22, was killed in North Lawndale. These are cold-blooded murders -- one man walking up to another and shooting him dead.

So when I was repeating my theories about healthier communities to my mother the other day, I had to stop and back up: Either I'm just plain wrong or the efforts underway in the New Communities Program neighborhoods are just not big enough, not good enough, not widespread enough to combat what one of my colleagues has called "a culture of thuggery."

In neighborhoods where one man shoots another for taking a cigar dropped outside of a West Side club, existing efforts are clearly not enough. Getting guns off the street is part of the answer, yes, but at heart this is a human and societal problem, a deep wound in the urban heart that we have not yet learned how to heal.

'Our children and future are dying'

Gun protest at the Thompson Center. Photos by Gordon Walek.

When word came through about the latest killing of a Chicago teenager – the gun death on Sunday of Julian High School senior Kiyanna Salter on a CTA bus – it hit me as it always does, with sadness and anger that the affected families and communities must absorb this terrible hurt and somehow move on.

For the people around that young person, the pain must be debilitating. How can it not create a feeling of helplessness? The senseless killing of a child knocks down whole networks of people and institutions, or at least slows them down in whatever work or progress they might have been making. It ripples through classrooms. It travels down blocks and through neighborhoods and within families. It is personal.

And so it hurts even more to learn that Kiyanna Salter was a cousin of Southwest Organizing Project organizer Rabbi Joshua Salter, who works on safety issues on the Southwest Side. The death touched that neighborhood, too.

But violence can also galvanize responses, and two came across my desk today.

First, the Sun-Times reported that Chicago schools CEO Arne Duncan refused to accept an anti-violence award from the Illinois Coalition Against Handgun Violence. He cited the eight students killed in the first month of the school year, and left the award on the table. "I don't feel I can accept this award, not quite yet," he said. "I don't feel I've earned it."

Second, I heard from Ernie Sanders in Auburn Gresham, who alerted me to a gun-control protest planned by members of St. Sabina Parish at 11 a.m. this Friday, October 10, at the Thompson Center. This is a return visit after a similar rally on September 24 (photos) and obviously just as needed.

Below, the notice of the protest. The second paragraph packs a punch.

"Our Children and Future are Dying"

"In response to 3 more of our children being killed due to gun violence we will meet on Friday at The Thompson Center from 11am to 12pm.

"It is still our mission to have "Common Sense Gun Laws" enacted in this state. This school year, 2008-2009, has already seen Chicago Public Schools lose 11 students. Understand we have only completed one month of school, and we have lost 1/3 of a classroom.

"Please help us get the word out, raise awareness, and put an end to the destruction of our children, our future. If you need to ride the bus to the rally please call the Rectory at 773-483-4300, the bus will be leaving the church at 10 am."

Two more takes on youth violence

Photo by Alex Fledderjohn

A big event took place at United Center this weekend as the Near West Side Community Development Corporation kicked off its Safe Summer Basketball League. A table next to the stage was covered with 30 pairs of gym shoes, representing the youth lost to violence this school year in Chicago. Earnest Gates delivered a heartfelt speech about this loss to society, and how youth can choose the "shoes of success" instead.

The league's games will be played on Thursday afternoons at Crane High School, where 18-year-old Ruben Ivy was killed on March 7. Check out the speech below.




Another take comes from Community Beat contributor Maureen Kelleher and Gabrielle Lyon in a story from Catalyst-Chicago about Jason Gill, a boy whose curiosity and drive wasn't enough to escape gang violence in his Back of the Yards neighborhood.

"Putting people on the street who know the neighborhood and are trained to interrupt violence works," wrote Kelleher and Lyon. "How many more times will we leave young men like Jason Gill to play the odds before we have the strength to do what we know is right?"

Taking action: "Saving Black Boys"

Teamwork Englewood is taking the direct approach to the youth-engagement challenge: it hopes to connect 100 African-American boys with mentors and constructive programming. Phillip Jackson of the Black Star Project kicked off the process at an April 11 event that filled Teamwork's space at Park National Bank on 63rd Street. Four partner agencies – Englewood United Methodist Church, the Peace Center, Boulevard Arts and West Englewood United Methodist Church – will each recruit and support 25 youth.

The goals are to help boys succeed in school and avoid drugs, gangs and violence, said Johnnie Muhammad, Teamwork Englewood's NCP organizer. It's all part of a United Way national pilot program trying to “rescue Black boys from the tragedy we’ve been seeing the last 20 years,” he said.

Read the full story by Richard Muhammad on the Teamwork Englewood web site.

Solutions to violence: complicated and layered

About 15 years ago when my kids were attending Kilmer Elementary in Rogers Park, a teenager was shot and killed less than 50 yards from the school, which is across the street from Sullivan High School.

It was a traumatic event for the community and it triggered an all-out safety effort among parents and administrators at the two schools. I won't ever forget the months that followed when other parents and I stood on sidewalks and corners after school, wearing orange Parent Patrol armbands. I worked a particularly vulnerable corner with a mother who knew how to talk to teenagers, and I learned from her how to ask groups of older teenagers – in a voice that was both respectful and firm – to move on until after the little children had made it home from school.

The fear and determination I felt in those years has come back to me often in recent months as I read the ongoing reports of killings and beatings near schools across the city. Violence that takes our youth away from us is debilitating at multiple levels: on the blocks where it happens, within the affected families and school communities, and for the city as a whole. How can we consider Chicago a strong city, after all, if children are killed on the streets and we can't stop it?

The fact is, we have many of the tools needed to prevent or reduce violence, and many examples of effective partnerships among community groups, youth programs, the police and violence-prevention groups. Maureen Kelleher just wrote an excellent report on youth-led efforts in Little Village, in which she captured powerful lessons from youth who have been affected by violence.

So I asked Maureen: "Shouldn't there be comprehensive efforts at the neighborhood level that create a level of protection for kids?" She answered with a question: "What would that program look like?"

That's the life-or-death question that a new University of Chicago study will try to get at, but it seems to me that an academic study isn't where the answers are going to be found. They'll be found on the street by committed youth, organizers, police, school administrators and others who work together to create a resilient web of safety.

The question remains: What would that program look like?