TNT youth leaders and staff with OPD representatives at the forum.
This year Teens on Target is leading an effort to open up the lines of communication between the Oakland Police Department and Oakland youth, especially young people of color. Officers have attended Teens on Target meetings for intimate dialogues, and just before the end of the school year, TNT hosted a big public forum on Police/community relations at Castlemont attended by over 200 students, staff and faculty. The forum featured a panel of OPD officers and TNT youth leaders for a wide-ranging 90-minute discussion that at times was tense but in the end served as a promising kickoff of an ongoing TNT project to increase police transparency and to lift the veil that impedes mutual understanding between the community and the police. OPD representatives on the panel included longtime OPD veterans, Captains LeRonne Armstrong and Ersie Joyner, Sgt. Gordon Dorham and Officer Robert Smith. The panel took questions from the audience about what their training procedures are for dealing with youth of color, what to do if you feel you have been mistreated by the police, and what it’s like to be an African American police officer in Oakland. Next steps in the TNT’s work to address the climate of relations between the police and civilians of color in Oakland will be to help the Mayor’s public safety director as she puts together an OPD Youth Leadership Council to review policy recommendations, provide training to officers on how to deal with young people, advise on hiring, and offer their own policy recommendations.
In late June at Bocanova Restaurant in Oakland, 175 of our closest friends joined us to celebrate Youth ALIVE!’s 25 years of violence prevention, intervention and healing. Oakland Mayor Libby Schaaf called Youth ALIVE! “Oakland’s homegrown leader in the struggle to end violence.” She addressed the gathering and spoke about the effect of our work. “Youth ALIVE! saves lives," she said.
Miracle and Mom Sandra Campbell at YA! celebration
TNT Youth Leader, and new Castlemont High School graduate, Miracle Robinson gave a great speech at Youth ALIVE!’s 25th anniversary dinner celebration at Bocanova in June. She even brought her mom, Sandra Campbell, up to be by her side while she told us about growing up in East Oakland, about how her mom taught her right from wrong, and how much TNT and Youth ALIVE! have meant to her. We will miss Miracle!
What: Youth ALIVE! is 25 Celebration Dinner When: Thursday, June 22, 2017, 5:30 to 9:00 Where: Bocanova Restaurant, 55 Webster Street, Jack London Square, Oakland
The young leaders in our Teens on Target program had wanted to do a toy drive for a long time. They thought about it at Christmas time, but figured there were plenty of toy drives going on then. So, they waited until the spring to do theirs.
Congress heard an important message in April about violence as a public health issue. An all-star panel featuring Youth ALIVE! Executive Director Anne Marks brought that message to Washington in a congressional briefing co-hosted by Congressman Mike Quigley of Illinois.
Big thanks for our friends at Oaklandish for naming Youth ALIVE! their Nonprofit of the Month for March 2017. We are recipients also of an Oaklandish Innovators Award for 2017. And on Saturday, March 18th, at their Dimond store, at 3419 Fruitvale Ave, Youth ALIVE! gets 10% of all proceeds for the day. Come out that day, buy some cool stuff, and meet some of our Teens on Target youth leaders and violence prevention educators.
Violence follows poverty and strife and hardship, whether in Deep East Oakland or south central South Dakota. The Rosebud Reservation, home to the Rosebud Sioux Tribe, spans 1,442 rugged, bleakly beautiful square miles on the Dakota/Nebraska border. The closest urban areas are 200 miles away. Unemployment stands at 83%. A recent study found that 100% of Rosebud youth have been exposed to some type of violence, either as witnesses or as victims. The crime rate is high, the police force small and thinly spread. Domestic and elder abuse are serious problems. In 2014, there were 638 reports of child abuse and neglect. Founded in 1977, the White Buffalo Calf Woman Society serves victims of domestic violence, sexual assault, dating violence and stalking. In 1980, they opened the first women’s shelter on an American reservation. For decades, they have been educators and advocates for the women of the whole sprawling community. Now they are preparing to help another segment of their community: male survivors of violence, and in snow, bitter cold January, Youth ALIVE!’s Adrian Sanchez and Samuel Martinez traveled to the reservation to help.
