New Yorkers impacted by gun violence who are now working to uplift the city’s youth and steer them away from deadly firearms got a funding boost Thursday — with money seized from major banks by the Manhattan district attorney.
District Attorney Alvin Bragg awarded $20,000 to eight community-based organizations working with young people in the Manhattan neighborhoods and NYCHA complexes most impacted by gun violence at Grand Street Settlement on the Lower East Side.
“I’m really humbled to be here for the third time,” Bragg said. “We are doing enforcement every day, obviously that’s a core part of our job, but as was said, it’s the partnership. It’s not just the prosecutors and the police officers, it’s the clergy, it’s the mentors, it’s the teachers, it’s the theatre leaders. It is all of us working in conjunction.”
Bragg credited a combination of initiatives he launched nearly three years ago to target gun violence — investing in communities and targeting prosecutions for a nearly 40% decline in shootings in Manhattan since the program’s launch. There are also 37% fewer victims of shootings in Manhattan since the start of the initiative, which has awarded stipends to nearly 420 New Yorkers working to curb gun violence.
Christopher Lawrence, who mentors teens and young adults at the Jefferson Houses in East Harlem through the grant recipient Not Another Child, said preventing teens from turning to guns is a matter of profound personal importance — he lost his son in a shooting last month.
“Being a credible messenger is how we get the youth to trust us, working with them and letting them see the value of themselves is going to change their lives,” said Lawrence, 40. “Teaching them how to avoid any type of confrontation, teach them how to talk things out — wake up without that anger.”
The money going to Not Another Child will be invested in 10 young people through targeted workshops that will help develop their cognitive behavioral skills and educate them about justice principles — while also providing mentorship, field trips, and participation in a community mural project.
In addition to groups working one-on-one with kids, the recipients include organizations dedicated to beautifying hot spots for gun violence, like Children’s Aid NYC.
GHOST GUNS
“We’ve been making murals and having town halls in our community to express our concern,” Amir Nina, 16, from the High School of Fashion Industries, told The Daily News at Thursday’s event. “The issue isn’t really that there’s adults shooting kids, it’s that there’s teens shooting teens. It’s kind of scary to know that somebody that you could have gone to school with, you can like see them on the street one day and they could be a completely different person because they got in with the wrong crowd.”
After the ceremony, Lawrence told the News mentorship comes in many different forms — and that lessons that may seem small can have the biggest impact.
“We work with kids on and off the clock,” Lawrence said. “We help them with mental health and hygiene, which also made them aware of things they didn’t really know about, like just waking up in the morning and taking a shower and how it feels compared to just waking up and jumping out the bed and going outside.”
The Harlem mentor said he knows all too painfully how critical gun violence prevention is.
“I lost a son, and I also lost somebody close to my daughter,” he told the News. “Within two months, both of them died by a gun. It’s very heartfelt to do this work, you know,” Lawrence said. “I just want to see the kids win. I want to see them win. I don’t want nobody hurt. Losing a child is a feeling that nobody wants. It’s really — it’s really painful.”
