Children in Harlem march to end gun violence
NEW YORK (FOX 5 NY) - Nearly 4,000 children from the Harlem Children’s Zone spent a summer day marching for safer streets, demanding an end to the gun violence plaguing Harlem and the nation.
“We understand there’s an uptick of gun violence going on in Harlem right now, we’re here today as we have been for 25 years to say ‘Not in our community,’” said Geoffrey Canada, founder of the Harlem Children’s Zone.
The march was begun a quarter-century ago when an elementary school girl was struck by a bullet.
“So often people look at brown and black children as predators,” said Anne Williams-Isom, CEO of the Harlem Children’s Zone. “Well, we’re not predators.”
According to the HCZ, 27 percent of the program’s high school students and middle school students they surveyed had lost a family member to violence, many of them to gun violence.