Dozens of teens meet at violence prevention summit
PITTSBURGH (KDKA) - A group is bringing local youth together to promote violence prevention.
Mount Ararat is the home of the first teen Public Safety and Violence Prevention Summit. It's a way for the youth of Pittsburgh to strategize with law enforcement professionals on how to prevent future violence and their friends from dying.
Youth Enrichment Services hopes to carve out a safer future in the city.
"The goal is always try to save lives, that's number one," said Mayor Ed Gainey.
More than 100 teens gathered for the summit Friday, all sharing the all too familiar pain of the loss of a loved one gone too soon.
"I had lost one of my closest friends, Khalil Logan, to gun violence," said Willy Knight. "As a teen that took me a long way and I'm still trying to work through that trauma today."
Several of the teens in attendance are still dealing with the loss of their friend Mathew Steffy-Ross, who died in the mass shooting in East Allegheny on Easter. Sadly, he's just one of the more than three dozen lives lost to homicide in Pittsburgh so far this year.
"A lot of them are dealing with trauma," said panelist Miles Porter. "A lot of them are living everyday life to where they're seeing violence and witnessing crime, whether it's teens, parents, family members. So being able to raise awareness and come up with things for them to cope and let them know it's going to take a village, that we have a community, that we have other people to help, they don't have to face these issues alone."
As they talked with law enforcement and violence prevention experts to strategize how to be a community beacon instead of a statistic, Gainey says he sees hope in these kids and others like them that they are what can turn the darkness into light and reshape not only their future but also the city's.
"They have to see the opposite side of what they see every day," Gainey said. "People speaking to them about the importance of life and why right now what we're doing is all about saving their life. We want them to find value in life. The more value they find, the more they separate themselves from the rest of the pack."
Group leaders say this was the first summit, but it won't be the last. They believe the impact they could have with youth in Pittsburgh will be enough to help lower violence permanently among teens in the city.
