SPRINGFIELD, Mass. (WGGB/WSHM) – We’ve seen this before: youth violence, and the push to stop it. There are facilities out there looking to take kids in and keep them off the street, and on Wednesday, after two teens face gun charges for a double shooting in downtown Springfield, Western Mass News caught up with a couple of them.
So, where can kids go before they think to pull a trigger? Boys and Girls Club Interim Leader Charles Branche wants them to come to him.
“We want a place the kids can come to where they can feel safe, we can help build character, we can teach them about different things that are going on in their life and how to navigate those things,” he said. “Sometimes, the kids just want to come in and talk and let us know what’s going on in their daily lives. Sometimes its family, sometimes its peer to peer.”
Juanita Batchelor of the Darrell Lee Jenkins Resource Center added more.
“We have to start younger, we can’t keep doing all of these programs for 16, or 17 or young adults and up; these shooters are 13 or 14,” she emphasized.
Juanita Batchelor turned pain into purpose. Her son, Darrell Lee Jenkins Jr., was murdered, and that incident led to the opening of a resource center that bears his name to help people dealing with gun violence.
She tells us finding community is one thing, and consequences are another.
“Yes, we want community centers for our kids that live in these neighborhoods or have lost their parents but at the same time, we need to get these shooters off the street. A community center can’t help that.”
Charles agrees that life lessons begin at home.
“The connection between us and the parents has to be there so the kids know that we work as a team. So, we facilitate a lot of conversation with the parents, so we’re all working together, a lot of time the insight that the parents can give us at home, helps us work with the kids here.”
Copyright 2025. Western Mass News (WGGB/WSHM). All rights reserved.
发表回复