A call-to-action conference last month bore two community efforts the City of Gary hopes will pack a one-two punch in cleaning up the city.
Mayor Karen Freeman-Wilson during a Friday morning press conference announced the two initiatives and said they would work toward not only reducing crime, but cleaning up the city as well. Once those happen, economic development has a better chance of taking hold, she said.
“I cannot emphasize enough how important it is that this be community-based,” Freeman-Wilson said. “I’ve said it before: We could hire 900 new officers and still never address crime in the city. We need to emphasize education, jobs and opportunities in the community.”
The first initiative, named Blessed Block, will kick off at 6:30 p.m. Sept. 11 in the 4th District, the city’s largest. It will include several pastors out in the streets talking with people and, more importantly, “bringing them hope,” according to the Rev. SeonRoberts, who’s heading the project.
“We will canvas the neighborhood and engage people,” Roberts said.
The second initiative, sponsored by Anthony Disco of J & D Construction, will bring at least 1,000 volunteers out to clean up vacant lots and help with other maintenance the city can’t always perfom. The mayor explained that where there was once 400 employees in the city’s General Services Department, that number was reduced to 150 after the property tax caps kicked in in 2006.
There are now 20 General Services employees for a 52 square-mile city, she said.
Additionally one-third of the city’s houses are in the names of people who’ve long since died, and another third belong to banks from when people left.
“People didn’t leave in an orderly manner,” Freeman-Wilson said. “So now, General Services is working, but they’re working dump sites and patching holes in the streets, and maintaining city property.
“Neighbors are maintaining properties adjacent to them, but they need the help to get the process going.”
Disco, who was raised in the Emerson area, said he plans to give the effort “100 percent.”
“I do business all over (Lake County) – I go to Portage, Merrillville, Hammond, East Chicago, but (Gary) is where I do most of my business,” Disco said. “People say there’s no work here, but I beg to differ.”
He also praised the ecumenical efforts of the ministers, who may be able to reach people who need the encouragement the most. Having spent time in prison when he was young, he said he could’ve used a kind word.
“When I came out, I’d walk the streets for hours because the friends I had didn’t want to be around someone who wanted to change,” Disco said. “I want to mentor the guys who want it.”
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Michelle L. Quinn is a freelance reporter for the Post-Tribune.