LANSING, Mich. — Lansing has had its fair share of gun violence. So far this year, Lansing Police have reported a total of 12 gun related deaths.
“We know that gun violence is a threat to public health,” said Paul Elam with the Advance Peace Initiative.
Advance Peace Focuses on connecting with those who have been involved in gun violence. Elam overseas the initiative and said last year Advance Peace took 15 young at-risk young people through its Advance Peacemaker Fellowship.
“It's an 18 month program that takes these young people through 13 evident based practices to prevent them from being involved in gun violence,” Elam said.
Those practices include things like conflict mediations, street out reach and more.
Advance Peace has been operating in Lansing for about a year now, and we're told since then, gun deaths have dropped by 65%, but there is still work needed to be done.
“We were told that there were about 30 to 35 people who were carrying weapons and targeting folks. This is called retaliatory gun violence, but that number is up by 88% Elam said.
Now the initiative is hoping to take at least 60 more young people through the fellowship, with expansions to the southeast side of town, East Lansing and inside of Lansing schools.
“We want to place peacekeepers in the neighborhoods surrounding all of high schools,” Elam said. “Those peacekeepers will be in the buildings, at the games and keeping an eye on what’s going on.”
Elam said this is all possible because of money the Advance Peace has secured from funders like the county and the City of Lansing. He also said Advance Peace wouldn’t be where it is, without the help of the community.
“Every community is not in support of Advance Peace, so we thank you all for helping us make these strides in reducing the violence” he said.
