Saturday afternoon dozens of local community organizers gathered to rally against gun violence.
"If we think about how we address violence in America now typically it’s responsive…we typically call law enforcement in and ask them to be everything in regards to everything that goes on in our community and we’re seeing the result of it and we have failed," said Dr. Chico Tillmon working with Fund Peace.
The organization is working to promote grass-root community efforts that work to prevent violence throughout the country.
Tillmon spoke amongst the 414 Life group as well as the Office of Violence Prevention. According to Director of 414 Life, Derreck Rogers, the group prevented more than 150 conflicts through interventions in the last two years. He believes half of those would have had deadly consequences if it was not for the interrupters. The interrupters work throughout the city in identified "hot spots" to de-escalate potentially violent situations.
Last month, the Biden-Harris administration committed $5 billiondollars in federal funding toward community-led gun violence prevention initiatives.
Today's actions in response to this crisis by the Biden-Harris Administration follow a White House commitment, secured by the Fund Peace Campaign, of $5 billion toward community-led gun violence prevention initiatives as a part of the American Jobs Plan.
"Please fund us correctly, robustly, allow us to address and attack epidemic of violence because we are the cure and we know how to address it," said Tillmon.
Now the decision is in the hands of local leaders to allocate the funds accordingly.
