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Local News: Reverend Eugene Rivers of Boston meets with Ontario Premier Dalton McGuinty Black Habits Articles Premier Dalton McGuinty has asked the black faith community to come up with a proposal to lessen the grip of guns and gangs on the city.

“I’m very heartened that representatives of the faith community have decided that they’re going to take on still more responsibility for the black community when it comes to addressing the issue of crime and guns,” McGuinty said after meeting with Boston’s Rev. Eugene Rivers and members of Toronto’s black religious community.

“I specifically asked that the community prepare a substantive proposal, something that we could carefully consider,” he said.

The proposal has to be “effective” and “justifiable in the eyes of taxpayers,” he said. Rivers, one of the architects of the “Boston miracle,” which dramatically reduced gun crime there, was brought to Toronto by the faith community.

“We come out of the meeting with an understanding that there are mutual obligations,” Rivers said. “Now it is in*****bent on the black leadership, represented in the meeting, to generate the kinds of politically and programmatically viable proposals that can be over the long term produced to correct a correctable problem.”

Boston’s strategy succeeded because pastors, like Rivers, moved in and began mentoring drug dealers and young men at risk of joining gangs. Strengthening the capacity of faith-based organizations to “mentor the most violent young people in the poorest neighbourhoods,” is one element of a possible proposal for Toronto, Rivers said.

“Ministering, mentoring, monitoring,” needs to be part of a broader strategy of “prevention, intervention and enforcement,” Rivers said, echoing comments he made earlier in the day to a dozen local city councillors.

While Rivers said he was encouraged by the response he got from the premier, he said there is only so much the government can do. “This is a family conversation. It requires that the black community come together, stop making excuses, move beyond rhetoric, race card and focuses on how do we as a community become more accountable?” Rivers said.

“We are simply asking the government to help us in developing programs that serve young people,” he said. Reverend Don Meredith, of GTA Faith Alliance, said it would take a month or so to develop a proposal that could be brought to the premier.

Rivers also met with Mayor David Miller and Ontario Chief Justice Roy Mc- Murtry, who heads up the city’s community safety plan.

Note: TORSTAR NEWS SERVICE
Posted on Tuesday, January 10 @ 10:34:15 UTC by jcohen



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