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Chicago Leaders Unite Against 'Social Service Gangbanging'

By DNAinfo Staff on April 7, 2013 8:42am

SOUTH LOOP — Bad parents. Poor education. Gangbanging. What causes Chicago’s violence?

Government and social leaders couldn’t pinpoint any simple causes or easy answers to the city's shooting and murder problems Saturday, but they all agreed it would “take a village” to solve them.

About 80 audience members listened to a Black Women's Expo town-hall meeting with local government representatives that included Cook County Clerk of the Court Dorothy Brown, Juliana Stratton of the Cook County Justice Advisory Council, and Chicago Police Deputy Superintendent Al Wysinger.

Panelists offered what they see as problems with the handling of the city's violence, and how they had begun working with others on the panel to reduce it.

“The way we've tried to police the city of Chicago, and crime in general, has just not worked. We cannot arrest our way out of this situation,” Wysinger said. “…It's not going to happen by one entity, its going to take an entire village to make this stop."

When social service organizations try to stop violence but don't work together, they’re forming their own cliques, and doing their own form of 'gangbangin’,' said Brother Enoch Muhammad, director of Hip-Hop Detoxx, a youth outreach arts program.

“We need to wrap around the problem by working with other people. But when you have social service gangbangin', religious gangbangin'...then people are not working together, they're working against each other,” he said. “I’ll hook up with Tio [Hardiman, director of CeaseFire], I'll hook up with the Urban League, I'll hook up with Dorothy Brown, I'll hook up with anybody who authentically is working.”

Pastor Corey Brooks, of New Beginnings Church, and Rev. Michael Pfleger, of St. Sabina's Catholic Church, attributed crime to unemployment, poor education and other social ills, problems Pfleger said he’s been talking about for 37 years.

“Until these communities are given the infrastructure, the education, the employment, the jobs and the economic development, we're going to keep talking about this forever," he said.

Gang members need opportunities to make something else of their lives, said Kareem Pender, of Chicago Urban League.

"We speak about Hadiya Pendleton at many of these events. God rest her soul, but Hadiya Pendelton was involved in activities. She was involved in after-school programs. What about the shooter?" he said. "What activities are we going to pull them into? What are we going to get them to be a part of? Because those are the souls we have to capture, we have to save from...pulling that trigger."

Tio Hardiman, director of CeaseFire Illinois, was hopeful Chicago’s murder prognosis for 2013 could be good, if the city could “just reach a tipping point.”

“The homicides are down, and that’s a result of the police, CeaseFire, and all the groups working together to do the best we can,” he said.  “If we can get April down by another 69 percent, we can have the lowest year ever as far as homicides.”