NY Governor Kathy Hochul and Buffalo Mayor Byron Brown announced the creation of a committee tasked with planning and overseeing the construction of a memorial in East Buffalo.
Joshua Bessex / AP
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Joshua Bessex / AP
NY Governor Kathy Hochul and Buffalo Mayor Byron Brown announced the creation of a committee tasked with planning and overseeing the construction of a memorial in East Buffalo.
Joshua Bessex / AP
Five months after a white gunman was killed 10 black people and 3 others injured at a grocery store in Buffalo, NY, New York State, and local officials and community members are working together to honor the victims with a new memorial on Buffalo’s East Side.
New York Governor Kathy Hochul and Buffalo Mayor Byron Brown announced last week the creation of the May 14 Memorial Committee, which will work to build a permanent memorial to honor the victims of May 14 fatal shooting.
They said the creation of the memorial committee is part of the state’s longstanding commitment to support and uplift the East Buffalo community in the wake of the racist attack.
“We wanted to do something that people remember. A place to come and reflect. A place to honor. And a place to say never again,” Hochul said. speak in a news conference announcing the commission on Friday.
The memorial committee – whose efforts will be led by Buffalo NAACP president Father Mark E. Blue – will focus on finding and acquiring land for a new memorial, engaging with the victims’ families and Buffalo community for input on the memorial’s design in addition to securing funding for the project.
According to Hochul, the memorial will be “sensitive to what the families want”.
“Our community is deeply affected by the events of May 14, 2022, and the May 14 Memorial Committee will bring transformative ideas to the fore to support healing and create a symbol of remembrance,” Brown said at a news conference.
Hochul and Brown did not elaborate on when the memorial was completed.
Garnell Whitfield, who lost his mother Ruth Whitfield in the shooting, told Buffalo TV station WKBW that the process of creating a permanent memorial to honor the victims could begin immediately.
Whitfield said in a statement.
The establishment of the May 14 Memorial Committee comes after the New York attorney general’s office announced The report is 49 pages long alleged that several online platforms played an extremist role in radicalizing the alleged gunman, 19-year-old Payton Gendron.
The attorney general’s office reviewed thousands of pages of documents and social media content to study how the alleged gunman used online platforms to plan, prepare, and publicize the shooting. series.
As a result of the investigation, both New York Attorney General Letitia James and Governor Hochul speak they support state legislation to criminalize images and videos created by the perpetrator of a murder.
At the federal level, Gendron is face the number 27 indictment – including 10 hate crimes leading to death and 3 hate crimes related to attempted murder.
He has not been released on bail since his arrest following the May 14 shooting.
