On Friday, on Broadway Avenue in Cleveland’s Slavic Village neighborhood, youth from Boys & Girls Clubs of Northeast Ohio’s (BGCNEO) Broadway Club called for a “Stop to the Violence.”
During a community event at the club, organized by the students and part of the Bigger Than Basketball program supported by the Cleveland Cavaliers, Cleveland-Cliffs and the Cleveland Peacemakers Alliance, members of the Club called for an end to violence in the Broadway-Slavic Village neighborhood.
This community of children felt passionately about putting on this program because they were personally touched by gun violence. A member of the BGCNEO program lost their life to gun violence this past school year. Many of the students said they had also lost family and friends to gun violence and they wanted to issue a call to action to “Stop The Violence.”
The Broadway neighborhood sees a disproportionate number of gun-violence incidents versus other Cleveland communities, according to 2022 data from the Cleveland Department of Public Health. Shootings are most likely among people under 18, according to reporting from The Trace, a nonprofit group that reports on gun violence.
One BGCNEO student at the Stop the Violence event, named Sofia, said “It’s important to do this so we can make a difference by helping others.”
Debbie Lewis, BGCNEO chief development officer added, “Youth coming together to address their community is great to see, especially because they were touched personally by one of their own community members lost to gun violence.”
Also in attendance was Myesha Watkins, executive director of the Cleveland Peacemakers Alliance, a program that focuses on community violence intervention. The Peaceamakers provided a giveaway of gun safe and storage boxes supplied through the Academy of Medicine located in Independence. Watkins also announced that she has been appointed administrator of the Peacemakers Program for all of Cuyahoga County during the event.
Members of NAMI Greater Cleveland, Literacy in the H.O.O.D., Ghetto Therapy, The Haven Home and the Cleveland Rape Crisis Center also attended the Stop the Violence event.
The Stop the Violence event ended with the kids making cards for those people affected by gun violence. The cards will be used as part of a partnership between MetroHealth, University Hospitals and BGCNEO. Through the program, the cards will be offered to community members impacted by gun violence.
More information on BGCNEO can be found on the group’s website.
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