ARCHIVES OF LEAD STORIES
March 31, 2005
Youth groups combine forces to lobby for more resources
Jeremy Schwab
In the wake of a spate of murders last summer, Boston teenagers
came together to pressure elected officials to prevent violence
by creating more jobs for young people and mandating better pay
for youth workers.
The teens and youth workers who work with them plan to present
their demands to Mayor Thomas Menino, Governor Mitt Romney and
the entire Boston delegation of state representatives and senators
during a forum at the Fairmount Copley Plaza Hotel on April 6.
One of the coalition’s key requests is that the state, city
and federal governments increase funding for summer jobs for teenagers.
Budget cuts in recent years have reduced both the number and duration
of summer jobs.
Advocates for more summer jobs say that employment gives teens
less time or inclination to break the law.
“In 1998, 1999 and 2000, I had a summer job,” said
Calvin Feliciano, 20, who grew up in the Villa Victoria development
in the South End. “When they started to get cut, you’d
see a lot of people in the ‘hood, young people, with nothing
to do during the day or at night. You have a hot, steamy, broke
day to look forward to. You have little to do but think about
how to get in trouble.”
Feliciano helped publicize the forum on behalf of his boss, City
Councilor Chuck Turner, who along with City Councilor Felix Arroyo
and state Rep. Byron Rushing and others has helped support the
young people’s organizing effort.
The forum will allow public officials to hear from the youths
and give their feedback on what policies could help prevent violence.
The youths involved in organizing the forum come from groups including
Teen Empowerment, the Mission Hill Collaborative, the South End/
Lower Roxbury Youth Workers Alliance and the Roxbury Environmental
Empowerment Project. The youths aim to become a year-round lobbying
entity for young people’s concerns, said Turner.
“Right now all the interests — the elderly, disabled,
the business community, people organizing around affordable housing
— are organized,” he said. “The one group that
doesn’t have a continuous voice is the young, and I think
that is one reason their needs and concerns are not dealt with
as seriously as they need to be.”
In October, an estimated 125 young people, organized by youth
workers, met to discuss the increase in violence and the drop
in funding for various youth programs. The upcoming forum will
be the next step in the youths’ campaign to fight violence.
In order to solve problems affecting young people, policy makers
need to listen to the concerns and ideas of young people, said
Arroyo.
“We elected officials that have been involved in this initiative
believe that problems that affect youths need to be approached
with a youth initiative,” he said. “They don’t
need us to talk down to them and come up with opinions on why
[violence] happened.”
Arroyo and Turner say they expect to file legislation that would
call on the city or state to meet the youths’ demands.
“For policies they suggest that are not on the books, we
will work with them to try and implement those policies and pass
them through legislation at the municipal and state level,”
said Arroyo.
So far, the only elected officials to confirm their attendance
are Arroyo and Turner, according to Feliciano. But others simply
have not yet made up their minds, he said. The forum will take
place from 4 to 6 p.m. April 6 at the Fairmount Copley Plaza Hotel.
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