Good morning. Today is Monday. We’ll look at how recent child or teen shootings have had an impact on young people. We will also look at Mayor Eric Adams’ plan to invest $171 million in services for the homeless.
It’s almost unthinkable, but at least 40 children and teenagers have been shot in New York City this year. As:
At least four of those shot when a gunman opened fire in a Brooklyn subway car two weeks ago – or injured in a panic attack on the platform at the next stop – were children or bars. youth. But they are not the only young people affected by the shooting. Classrooms are locked, closed to visitors as students plastered their windows with messages of hope – and anxiety.
On the same day, a community 16 miles away in the Bronx is facing a tragedy, a memorial to a 16-year-old boy who dreamed of becoming a model. She was killed when hit by stray bullets, and two other teenagers were injured. She is walking home from school.
The next afternoon, when police arrested a 62-year-old man in the subway attack, dozens of East Flatbush teenagers stood outside their middle school and cried. They are mourning a 12-year-old who was killed – shot in an identity mistake.
“It’s really hard for me to admit that I’m really, really hard,” said Tatiana Barrett, 14, a student at Brooklyn Academy of Engineering and Science and a friend of the slain 12-year-old boy. pain. “As the days went by, I became more and more angry.”
It is well known that the pandemic has created new mental health problems for young people. Medical groups have declared a child and adolescent mental health emergency Last fall, a crisis that included uncertainty and grief. More than One out of every 200 children in New York has lost a parent or caregiver with the virus, almost twice the national rate, a recent analysis shows.
And as shootings increase during the pandemic, so does the number of young people arrested in violence. Children and teenagers have accounted for one in 10 victims this year, and the overall number is tracking to match or exceed the number of teen victims last year, when 138 people were hit by bullets.
That made Grief only gets more intense for children and adolescents.
Experts have long warned of long-term failures in learning and health for students exposed to gun violence. Dr. Aditi Vasan, a pediatrician at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, where gun violence hit a new high last yearindicates that the ramifications could come much earlier.
Dr. Vasan and other researchers noticed that in the two weeks after a shooting, children who live nearby are twice as likely to have to go to the emergency room for problems like anxiety, depression, and self-harm. It’s remarkable how quickly symptoms can appear, she said.
After the East Flatbush mistaken identity shooting, Tatiana Barrett said she had trouble concentrating, often describing herself as “cloudy-minded”. Her mother says she has become withdrawn and asks to spend more time alone. She has known the shooting victim, 12-year-old Kade Lewin, since she was 10. She mourned him at the funeral last week, but for his burial the next day, she told her mother that “she couldn’t stand it.”
David Walcott Jr., a 12-year-old schoolmate, has asked to stay home for Kade’s school memorial service and funeral, the boy’s father said. He had become nervous, worried about who might be the next victim. David, who was watching TV at 2 a.m. recently, was confused when a car driving outside was hit by a jet.
“Why do we live here?” His father, David Walcott, recalled his question. “He said he was beginning to understand racism. He said, ‘It just happens in our neighborhood that innocent people are dying.’ “
Teenagers in East Flatbush released three turquoise balloons into the sky at the end of the Kade memorial service. The wind swept a treetop where it swayed, a reminder of the nagging pain at the nearby school.
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Adams proposes more money for homeless services
More sponsorships for promote the movement of homeless people off the streets, Mayor Eric Adams is allocating $171 million for expanded services in his proposed budget. He said the money would pay for 1,400 makeshift beds for those currently living on the street, as well as new child care centers and outreach efforts.
Adams, who has focused on public safety and the city’s pandemic recovery since taking office in January, has under pressure to do more to help the homeless because the city has moved to demolish the plantations on the streets and in the subway system.
Adams’ plan would expand on a program begun under his predecessor, Bill de Blasio, to provide specialized shelter beds for out-of-town New Yorkers – beds in facilities with more services to ease the transition for homeless people struggling with mental health issues and substance abuse. problem. While facilities vary in size, they tend to be smaller than traditional barracks shelters and have fewer rules: no curfews and fewer restrictions on the use of drugs. drugs and alcohol.
Adams announced the addition of 500 beds. City officials said the plan he launched on Sunday would bring the total to more than 4,000.
“Too many of our New Yorkers are experiencing terrible homelessness,” the mayor said in a statement, “but we cannot and will not abandon them.”
Adams said he is including this amount in the operating budget for fiscal year 2023. As part of a preliminary budget of $98.5 billion in February, he proposed spending $2.1 billion for the Department. Homeless service.
City Council President Adrienne Adams welcomed the allocation of more services to the homeless. The speaker, who is not affiliated with the mayor, called the plan “the right approach and an important step forward for our city.”
The mayor, a former police captain, has defended police raids on homeless camps, some of which have been captured in videos that have gone viral on social media and show police throwing homeless people’s belongings in the trash.
Craig Hughes, a senior social worker with the Urban Justice Center, says his clients need the security and privacy of single rooms, and permanent housing positions that don’t require people to pass through the shelter system. While he said the mayor’s proposal to add shelter beds was a good idea, he denounced raids on homeless camps.
“His entire homeless policy is about getting rid of the homeless,” says Hughes.
What we are reading
METROPOLITAN . Diary
The birds look weird
Dear Diary:
I was at a thrift store on the Upper West Side when I saw a set of two unmarked, framed bird drawings.
The drawings are clearly the work of the same artist. They are odd-looking birds with large, open eyes made of coal.
I like one but not the other. The one I like is a single bird that looks like an emu staring to the side.
The other drawing is of two birds that look like dodos. They have the same expressions and are leaning forward, as if staring at the viewer. I just can’t see hanging that drawing on the wall and looking at it every day.
