This month the city of Boston has seen multiple homicides and nearly 20 shooting victims. Most of the shootings have taken place in Roxbury, Dorchester, and Mattapan, all of which are predominantly African-American communities.
In the past, gun violence has prompted peace walks and public safety summits. Now there’s a renewed call by a local group, Boston Black Ministers United For Change, to declare a “state of emergency” in the city of Boston. The group says the community is shell-shocked after the deaths of so many young people and is seeking a comprehensive plan to quell the violence. The group has a news conference planned for Monday at 11 a.m. to discuss a citywide and community plan to stop the violence.
Mayor Marty Walsh and Governor Charlie Baker have repeated their administrations' commitment to remove guns from the streets and to invest in key-initiatives to target at-risk youth and to create job programs.
Priscilla Flint-Banks, a Roxbury native, is volunteer with the group and co-founder of the Black Economic Justice Institute.
“They keep saying there’s not a state of emergency, but when people are being shot every day on the street, it is an emergency," she says. "When mothers are losing their children to violence every other day ... it is a state of emergency.”
Flint-Banks says the community is traumatized and something needs to be done to find a more workable solution.
“It seems like the only time we see our elected officials is when it’s an election year and they make promises that they don’t keep,” she says, adding that she thinks many of the solutions that city leaders are looking at are not the right solutions. “We need the mayor and the governor to sit down with community activists and people on the street that know what’s going on.”
To listen to Bob Seay's full interview with Priscilla Flint-Banks, click on the audio player above.
