Dear Editor:
My name is Steven Pinkney Sr. I was director of the largest youth at risk initiative in the country. During the summer, we held a five day per week, full day program for school age children. During a run from 1988 to 1994 we kept hundreds of children occupied and could boast that there were no incidents of violence. Although Jersey City Recreation (which I hope to soon be a member) and the Board of Education operate school based initiatives with recreation highlighted, there is a large demand for structured afterschool and summer programs to keep our children off the streets.
Jerry Walker is a Jersey City icon, responsible for helping to put Saint Anthony’s basketball on the national map. He has returned to his Lafayette roots to take on the unenviable task of providing youth-based programs for our at risk youth. For a dozen years, he has held basketball games which turn negative energy of hundreds of youth into positive recreation. He runs an afterschool program at Ercel Webb P.S. 22 School and may be expanding to reach more children. Few successful athletes have such hands-on programs as Mr. Walker. Jerry Walker’s lineage boast of his family’s 70 years of community service in Lafayette.
The newspapers have been writing a series of articles based on a protest by a small group of residents from the Pine Street community in the Jersey City Lafayette area. This group’s representative has indicated that he has been a resident of this community for six years and doesn’t want Jerry Walker to build a community center on property owned by Jerry’s Team Walker organization. My understanding is that about 20 residents have appeared at City Council meetings, Planning Board meetings and have held small rallies on Pine Street in protest of the center. They have made public their support for a community center but not on my block.
I have been directly involved with Jerry’s current efforts to reach more children in a more diverse program. I have spoken to community residents and groups which outnumber this opposition 20 to 1. This group’s protest reflects a message that dealing with (black) youth results in a reduction in quality of life.
I know the opposite is true. A supported after-school program creates a unified family attitude in a community. The parents become involved, the community becomes involved and a bond between children is formed where they begin to recognize they are partners in the community. They can partake in community service related programs as part of the program, and instead of hundreds of angry disinterested youth roaming the neighborhood we can create hundreds of united and focused young people. Jerry is not responsible for the creation of programs for our youth but takes on the heavy responsibility and should be honored, not disrespected. Since this group is new to the community it should endeavor to create alliances instead of alienations.
Steven Pinkney Sr.