Continuing to help — community still needed in Oakwood
You, YES YOU, can help
Lately, gun violence is taking center stage in Alton. I stayed up late last night talking to folks who were on the scene of a shooting outside 3rd Chute II bar in the early morning hours. Another person is dead from bullet wounds before 17-year-old Alton girl Shabrya Hudson has been laid to rest. There are lots of nebulous ideas for solutions, but solving such a large issue quickly enough to prevent more victims is a herculean task.
So, often, we are stuck as a community in the wreckage left behind, forced to be reactive, because being proactive is systemically blocked. Poverty, race, social media, gun culture, and current events all play a role in why this shit is all too common. The solution we offer is a word just as nebulous, complicated, and hard to quantify as violence. It’s community.
Much like violence, community is a word with an agreed upon meaning, which means something a little bit different to everyone. However, also like violence, it can be examined by its actions. Two young men were charged for this young woman’s death for their alleged act of violence. Several folks who are a part of the community are stepping up to help in acts of community.
Donald Mason-El, who is one of the main organizers and operators of FLY Mentorship, has been tackling the needs of community through that organization. Nearly 100 kids from Oakwood Estates and Alton Acres are part of this program, which brings in professionals to teach children about different career paths, including those requiring trade school or university degree. He has been championing several paths toward community betterment for years. This recent tragedy, however, highlighted a need.
Since the death of Shabrya, Mason-El has pushed for the Alton Housing Authority (AHA) to get gates in front of Oakwood and Alton Acres so tenants could feel safer. He said that it would work to keep folks out of the neighborhood who are not invited and also weed out bad tenants who are adding to the violence. He described Oakwood as a spot for folks to cruise to on a night out.
“We were doing that when I was a kid,” Mason-El, who is now 51, said. “When we were out drinking a little, smoking a little with your friends, you’d stop by different spots and see what was going on for the night. Oakwood was one of those stops then and it is now, too. I wouldn’t want to live next to a stop like that.”
The gates, of course, are not an end-all, be-all for the violence plaguing the area. Mason-El attributes a lot of that to the greater issues of poverty, classism, racism, etc. that work to keep poor and oppressed people from social or economic mobility. The purpose of his mentorship program is to help kids the system would otherwise see murdered or locked up see a brighter future.
Mason-El — even with the best of intentions and a damn fine mentorship program — could not end the issues of poverty and oppression alone. That’s why we need community. We need mutual accountability. Folks get so lost in the scale of the issues they forget to do the little things to help. Those little things add up. They may not be as showcased as the acts of violence in our community, but they can mean even more.
The simple act of buying a fish sandwich to help bury a child worked. Mason-El said the sales from day one exceeded their expectations for two days of sales. There’s another one this afternoon from 1-6 p.m. at Oakwood Estates Rec Center. Mason-El said the fish will be sold rain or shine, adding that the rec center was outfitted to ensure indoor dining would be available. The money raised from the $10 sandwiches will go to the family of Shabrya.
There is also a GoFundMe set up with her family's blessing. As of late Sunday morning, it has $1,650, which is short of its $6,000 goal. The money raised by this will go to ease the financial strain this has caused her family. Remember, folks, these people live in low-income housing. Burying a child is expensive. This is a nightmare scenario for folks who aren’t experiencing extreme poverty. Please consider donating.
Tonight from 8:15-9 p.m., there is a candlelight vigil for the second annual Gun Violence Awareness event at Oakwood Estates. Organized by Patricia Brown, who is on the AHA board as well as as resident of Oakwood Estates, the event is being hosted to bring community solidarity to a bad situation in our community. The first 100 candles will be given freely. Folks are encouraged to attend from across Alton. This is an issue affecting all of us.
We will continue to follow the story of the man shot and killed at 3rd Chute in Alton overnight. We will also continue to follow the healing journey of Oakwood Estates. We want to shine a positive light onto that community and be there for their joy as well as their grief. We exist in a media space in which grief is shared but joy struggles to be known. I watched videos of folks from Paper Planes Ministries fixing bikes and giving them away to kids at Oakwood Estates. That did not get nearly the traction as shooting deaths.
I get that one is more serious and requires more attention, but we, as a community, often view low-income neighborhoods and future housing options with scorn and contempt, but the people who live there matter. They have the same needs and wants as the rest of the world, but an arbitrary economic system has determined they don’t deserve them because something about them doesn’t attract money.
Given the people who do attract money, I’d cast my lot with the poor.
A better world is inevitable. We just have to get there together.