DETROIT (WXYZ) — New efforts to curb crime in the city of Detroit are happening soon after $700,000 in grants were recently awarded to six community groups through a new program called ShotStoppers.
The community hopes it will be a true game changer when it's fully launched on Aug 1.
“If you turn on the radio, you hear people talking about killing each other for fun,” Renaissance High School senior Jalen Hill said.
Every day on the news, there’s a story about someone being killed or injured by gunfire. One of the most violent weekends in downtown Detroit was two months ago in April. There were 10 shootings, including in Greektown and at the Detroit Riverwalk.
Hill and fellow Renaissance High School senior Zatavia Wilson are interning downtown this summer, and both have lost family to gunfire.
“One of my cousins passed away from gun violence. It was a couple years back, but they just graduated high school,” Wilson said.
Hill and Wilson are both only 17 years old and believe dangerous messages are being delivered to their generation.
“Two months ago, one of my cousins, probably about (age) 21 or 22 was killed),” Hill said. “I feel like as long as people keep promoting it, it seems like in our rap, our music, our TV shows and stuff, even on social media people promote this type of stuff. So, we need to have more positive role models.”
That's why Detroit is launching a program called ShotStoppers on Aug. 1.
“I know when I was in middle school, they had a lot of programs where they would come in and talk about gun violence, which was really helpful. It starts young starts in the household,” Wilson said.
Six grass roots community groups were awarded $700,000 to help stop gun violence and improve communities. Negus Vu received one of the grants. He has been running The People's Action for 10 years.
“We're doing community engagement — we go into communities, knock on doors through surveys. We find out what their needs are and we organize around that,” Vu said. “Right now, we're at 7 Mile and Greenfield (roads). We’re doing bi-weekly cleanings every day. We’re doing night patrols on the weekend, we're serving food and then we're also helping people get jobs,” Vu said.
He said the grant money will help in their approach and strategy in the community.
“Our approach is dealing with the social health determinants, all the different variables that cultivate a certain behavior that leads to gun violence),” Vu said.
Deputy Mayor Todd Bettison says ShotStoppers is a game changer. The city council approved six contracts on July 1. Now is the ramp-up period where these groups will have to hit certain metrics to receive all of the funding.
“I think it’s going to make a tremendous difference because many of these groups have been doing the work self-funded,” Bettison said. “So, we’re talking about smaller grassroots groups that we all know, that I’ve had to call when I was with the police department and say hey, we can use your support.”
Saving the lives of Detroit teens like Hill and Wilson is one of the reasons ShotStoppers was created, and they're hoping it will make a difference after seeing first-hand what deadly violence can do.
“I'm happy to still be alive and I would just want to educate the younger people in my family, like I said, people promote violence, so just let them know it's not cool. It's so much more to life than violence,” Hill said.
