Brooklyn Borough President Eric Adams yesterday rolled out a multi-pronged plan to address the uptick in gun violence which includes educational videos on social media, outreach to young gang members and the use of a crisis management system (CMS) made up of credible local cure violence organizations to prevent retaliatory shootings.
Adams unveiled the plan yesterday on the steps of Borough Hall at a symbolic press conference featuring an empty grey casket and 101 pairs of shoes laid out to represent the 101 shooting victims in the 74 gun violence incidents that took place over the past week throughout the city – the most shooting incidents in one week since 1993, when Adams was a New York City Police Officer.
Joining Adams was a group of mothers who have lost their children to gun violence, anti-violence advocates and Black Lives Matter Brooklyn Chapter President Anthony Beckford.
“When parents lose a child to gun violence, the pain does not dissipate. It remains like the first time someone knocked on their door to say your child was lost to gun violence,” said Adams. “And on all the doors I knocked on as a police officer and a government official, I have not heard one parent feel less any pain based on where the bullet came from. Not one of them stated, ‘as long as it wasn’t a cop, as long as it wasn’t a gang banger.’ They felt the pain and when I close my eyes and hear the loud cry of ‘non, no, no, tell me its not true. It is the same loud cry if its Eric Garner’s parents or is one of these mothers here today.”
Adams said the first of his solutions was to produce a series of videos manuals teaching parents how to look for signs their child may be involved in gangs or drugs. This includes checking rooms, phones and backpacks, and noticing if they begin wearing certain colors like red which could be a sign they belong to the Bloods.
“We’re also going to call a gang summit and reach out to shooters and tell them to come into a room and talk about this violence,” said Adams, adding that a large percentage of the shootings are retaliatory in nature and this needs to be addressed.
Adams also said he’ll reach out to both the police and hospital medical staff about allowing CMS members into hospitals where shooting victims are being treated so that they can talk to angry family and friends to prevent the retaliatory shootings. He also spoke about the need for local police to work with CMS volunteers.
“The police department needs to communicate better with the CMS. It’s a disjointed system to fight a jointed crisis of gun violence. We need to connect the entire system and have them operate together so we have one mission of dealing with the violence,” he said.
Adams said he expects the first videos to be released in the coming weeks.
