Community organizations aim to curb juvenile violence

COLUMBIA, Mo. (KMIZ)

Multiple Organizations around Columbia are working to curb juvenile violence and crime by working with area youth.

Local Organizations such as Family Access Center of Excellence (FACE), Connections to Success, People Embracing Another Chose Effectively (P.E.A.C.E) and Destiny of Hope are working to help at-risk youth.

"We have kids, man, they are living in a sense of hopelessness," P.E.A.C.E Executive Director Julian Jackman said. "There's nothing here in Columbia for them to do. So what else do they have? The option is the streets and whoever is in the streets."

Mataka Askari is a mentor and an outreach coordinator with Connections to Success, and he said it's because of mentors like himself, that helped keep him out of trouble when he was a child.

"What curbed all of us was not a traditional educational system but access to information that was empowering," Askari said. "So, it's not just about stopping the violence. How do you cultivate the desire to engage in violence up on out of people? So, that's what we're doing with mentoring, right? We (are) cultivating that up out of them by teaching them different coping skills, different ways to deal with the anger, different problem solving skills through conflict resolutions." 

Cobbins said it's not just the efforts of mentors and kids that are needed, parents and the community need to work together to help these kids stay on the right path.

"Kids from my experience, do what they see and say what they hear," said Cobbins. "If you don't involve the parent in this in the same teaching as a child, all you're doing is putting a Band-Aid on a gunshot wound." 

Jordan Chavez, Clinical Case Manager at FACE, said the program officers a variety of resources to families and youth in Columbia.

"Our mission really is to support youth and families and connect them to community resources that can help meet their needs," Chavez said. "Any resources that they need, we try to find and we do that by supporting families who are with our case management services."