How we cut youth violence in Boston by 79 percent

I've learned some of
my most important life lessons

from drug dealers

and gang members

and prostitutes,

and I've had some of my most
profound theological conversations

not in the hallowed halls of the seminary

but on a street corner

on a Friday night, at 1 a.m.

That's a little unusual, since I am
a Baptist minister, seminary-trained,

and pastored a church for over 20 years,

but it's true.

It came as part of my participation

in a public safety
crime reduction strategy

that saw a 79 percent reduction
in violent crime

over an eight year period in a major city.

But I didn't start out wanting to be

a part of somebody's
crime reduction strategy.

I was 25, had my first church.

If you would have asked me
what my ambition was,

I would have told you

I wanted to be a megachurch pastor.

I wanted a 15, 20,000 member church.

I wanted my own television ministry.

I wanted my own clothing line.

(Laughter)

I wanted to be your long distance carrier.

You know, the whole nine yards.

(Laughter)

After about a year of pastoring,

my membership went up about 20 members.

So megachurchdom was way down the road.

But seriously, if you'd have said,
"What is your ambition?"

I would have said just to be
a good pastor,

to be able to be with people
through all the passages of life,

to preach messages that would have
an everyday meaning for folks,

and in the African American tradition,

to be able to represent the community

that I serve.

But there was something else
that was happening in my city

and in the entire metro area,

and in most metro areas
in the United States,

and that was the homicide rate

started to rise precipitously.

And there were young people
who were killing each other

for reasons that I thought
were very trivial,

you know, like bumping into someone
in a high school hallway,

and then after school shooting the person.

Someone with the wrong color shirt on

on the wrong street corner
at the wrong time.

And something needed
to be done about that.

It got to the point where it started
to change the character of the city.

You could go to any housing project,

for example, like the one that was
down the street from my church,

and you would walk in,
and it would be like a ghost town,

because the parents wouldn't allow
their kids to come out and play,

even in the summertime,
because of the violence.

You would listen in the neighborhoods
on any given night,

and to the untrained ear,
it sounded like fireworks,

but it was gunfire.

You'd hear it almost every night,
when you were cooking dinner,

telling your child a bedtime story,

or just watching TV.

And you can go to any emergency room

at any hospital,

and you would see lying on gurneys

young Black and Latino men

shot and dying.

And I was doing funerals,

but not of the venerated matriarchs
and patriarchs who'd lived a long life

and there's a lot to say.

I was doing funerals of 18-year olds,

17-year olds,

and 16-year olds,

and I was standing in church
or a funeral home

struggling to say something

that would make some meaningful impact.

And so while my colleagues

were building these cathedrals
great and tall

and buying property outside of the city

and moving their congregations out
so that they could create

or recreate the cities of God,

the social structures in the inner cities

were sagging under the weight
of all of this violence.

And so I stayed, because somebody
needed to do something,

and so I had looked at what I had
and moved on that.

I started to preach decrying
the violence in the community.

And I started to look
at the programming in my church,

and I started to build programs
that would catch the at risk youth,

you know, those who were on
the fence to the violence.

I even tried to be innovative
in my preaching.

You all have heard of rap music, right?

Rap music?

I even tried to rap sermon one time.

It didn't work, but at least I tried.

I'll never forget the young person
who came to me after that sermon.

He waited until everybody was gone,

and he said, "Rev, rap sermon, huh?"
And I was like, "Yeah, what do you think?"

And he said, "Don't do that again."

(Laughter)

But I preached and I built these programs,

and I thought maybe if
my colleagues did the same

that it would make a difference.

But the violence just
careened out of control,

and people who were not involved in
the violence were getting shot and killed,

you know, somebody going to buy
a pack of cigarettes

at a convenience store,

or someone who was sitting
at a bus stop just waiting for a bus,

or kids who were playing in the park,

oblivious to the violence
on the other side of the park,

but it coming and visiting them.

Things were out of control,

and I didn't know what to do,

and then something happened

that changed everything for me.

It was a kid by the name of Jesse McKey,

walking home with his friend
Rigoberto Carion

to the housing project
down the street from my church.

They met up with a group of youth

who were from a gang in Dorchester,

and they were killed.

But as Jesse was running
from the scene mortally wounded,

he was running in the direction
of my church,

and he died some 100, 150 yards away.

If he would have gotten to the church,
it wouldn't have made a difference,

because the lights were out.

Nobody was home,

and I took that as a sign.

When they caught some of the youth
that had done this deed,

to my surprise, they were around my age,

but the gulf that was between us was vast.

It was like we were in two
completely different worlds.

And so as I contemplated all of this

and looked at what was happening,

I suddenly realized that there was
a paradox that was emerging inside of me,

and the paradox was this:
in all of those sermons

that I preached decrying the violence,

I was also talking about
building community,

but I suddenly realized

that there was a certain
segment of the population

that I was not including
in my definition of community.

And so the paradox was this:
if I really wanted

the community that I was preaching for,

I needed to reach out

and embrace this group
that I had cut out of my definition.

Which mean not about building programs

to catch those who were
on the fences of violence,

but to reach out and to embrace those
who were committing the acts of violence,

the gang bangers, the drug dealers.

As soon as I came to that realization,

a quick question came to my mind.

Why me?

And isn't this a law enforcement issue?
This is why we have the police, right?

As soon as the question, "Why me?" came,
the answer came just as quickly.

Why me?

Because I'm the one who can't
sleep at night thinking about it.

Because I'm the one looking around saying
somebody needs to do something about this,

and I'm starting to realize
that that someone is me.

I mean, isn't that how
movements start anyway?

They don't start with a grand convention

and people coming together
and then walking in lockstep

with a statement.

But it starts with just a few,

or maybe just one.

It started with me that way,

and so I decided to figure out

the culture of violence

in which these young people
who were committing them existed,

and I started to volunteer
at the high school.

After about two weeks
of volunteering at the high school,

I realized that the youth
that I was trying to reach,

they weren't going to high school.

I started to walk in the community,

and it didn't take a rocket scientist
to realize that they weren't out

during the day.

So I started to walk the streets at night,

late at night,

going into the parks where they were,

building the relationships
that was necessary.

A tragedy happened in Boston
that brought an number of clergy together,

and there was a small cadre of us

who came to the realization
that we had to come out

of the four walls of our sanctuary
and meet the youth where they were,

and not try to figure out
how to bring them in.

And so we decided to walk together,

and we would get together

in one of the most dangerous
neighborhoods in the city

on a Friday night and on a Saturday night

at 10 p.m.,

and we would walk until two
or three in the morning.