HUMBOLDT PARK — There was plenty of blame to go around, but few answers to a recent surge in shootings in Humboldt Park during an emergency community meeting Tuesday night.
Police officers, the aldermen, Gov. Bruce Rauner, long-time residents, gangs, Mayor Rahm Emanuel, parents, the Puerto Rican Day Parade, the ACLU and general city and state funding woes were all mentioned at least once during the meeting as a reason for what Ald. Roberto Maldonado (26th) said has been the biggest upswing in violence since he took office.
"We want to make sure we express our anxieties, our anger our frustrations," Maldonado said. "Five years after we saw our crime and violence in our ward go down, now it's spiking back up. To me this is intolerable. We don’t have to tolerate that. We should not tolerate it.”
Maldonado said he holds the police accountable, but also called on the community to step up and help with information.
And while a bunch of adults talking about violence is a step, some argued that the people most impacted by the gang violence were missing from the conversation: young people.
"We are the ones that raise these kids. We are raising these kids with the problems that we created and nobody is listening to them," said Amy Williams, who has lived in Humboldt Park for 13 years. "I believe the solution lies within our young people. They are the ones that live it. They are the ones that are experiencing it."
Williams, a 45-year-old gang intervention specialist, emphasized the need for the neighborhood's kids to be involved in the process.
"They are the ones whose parents are in jail, parents are addicted, parents are working three jobs so they can’t be home and nobody is listening to the young people," she said. "Every big movement starts with young people. We’ve got to get them involved.”
Maldonado called the emergency meeting after multiple shootings that occurred last week in Humboldt Park including a daytime shooting that killed a man and wounded a second on a residential side street.
Another shooting occurred across the street from Maldonado's ward office on the 2500 block of West Division Street the next day.
Neither crime has been solved, but the acting commander of the Shakespeare District, Fabian Saldana, said the shooting on Division involved members of two rival gangs and the friend of a gang member who was not involved in either.
A Latin Dragon gang member from Clemente High School was walking with the friend who was unaffiliated, (or a "neutron," as police say) and the two were confronted by about six Spanish Cobras about 3 p.m., Saldana said.
The rival gang members ordered the "neutron" to thrown down the crown gang sign, disrespecting his friend, and when he refused the group jumped the victim. Shots were fired, but no one was hit, police said.
The Spanish Cobras imposed a 6:30 p.m. curfew on itself following the incident, Saldana said.
The fatal shooting of 24-year-old Luis Gonzalez, who was killed in the 3000 block of West Wabansia, is still causing issues on the block, according to neighbors.
Gonzalez's friends continue to gather at the memorial days later to drink and smoke marijuana, and someone shattered the window of a vehicle that parked along the curb where the memorial was earlier this week.
Tuesday's emergency meeting, which was attended by roughly 75 people, was held at the Humboldt Park Field House, which in the past had been the middle ground for peace between gangs whose territory was split by the park, according to Orlando Cintron, who previously worked with the crime intervention group CeaseFire.
Orlando Cintron blamed crime in Humboldt Park on a lack of funding for youth programs. [DNAinfo/Paul Biasco]
"This was the middle ground for peace," Cintron said.
Cintron and others raised the issue of a lack of jobs and programming for kids in Humboldt Park. He said he used to bring groups from the two sides of the park to the field house to play basketball, but now the gym is often rented out.
"Now the kids have to pay to play basketball here? What’s a guy going to do — sell some drugs to play basketball?” Cintron said. “They’re lost. They’re lost. They’re lost. They need a place to go.”
The commanders from both the Near West and Shakespeare Districts said they plan on increasing foot patrols in a number of higher crime areas, but stated that it is more difficult to conduct pro-active policing due to what has been called the "ACLU Effect."
The term came from an agreement reached between the ACLU and the police department, which has lead to drastically fewer investigative stop reports.
"Our rules of engagement, so to speak, are pretty strict," Saldana said. "We are under review by the ACLU and the department of justice currently right now. ... We have to remain pretty much 100 percent strict with our rules of engagement.”
The commanders and others also called on parents to step up.
"That person that's doing the bang, bang, bang and shooting that gun, he goes home to a mother and father. He goes home to a house. He goes somewhere," said Cmdr. Edward Kulbida of the Near West District. "Us as parents ... we have to become more vigilant as to what our kids are doing."
"As long as my kid was in my house, it may be her room, but it's my house. Take a look in that room every once in a while," Kulbida said. "Sitting here I'm hearing a lot of excuses coming from everybody. No money here, no money here, we can't do this, we can't do that. Let's talk about stuff we can do."
For more neighborhood news, listen to DNAinfo Radio here:
