A group of east side neighbors are working to crowd out the negative elements in their neighborhood with something they call positive loitering.
In a neighborhood of broken buildings and broken dreams, you might call Pastor Bob Ward “Good Will Walking”.
He leads First English Lutheran Church. On Wednesday afternoons, he leads a group of volunteers through some of the roughest streets in Columbus.
“We have a few pockets of open-air drug markets, pretty close by the church, as well as in a lot of our neighbors’ front yards. We’ve had gun violence over here,” says Ward.
Last month, church security cameras captured the flashes of gunfire lighting up the night.
“These are not disposable people here. We’ve got good neighbors here. 99 percent of our neighbors here are good, hard-working family people, wanting to make things better, and we’ve got a very small element that is dragging things down.” Ward said.
Ward credits Courtney Rowland with their latest effort to combat the negative element.
“One of the issues that we’ve had is just groups of guys hanging out on the street and sometimes not doing the most positive things, which we would see as negative loitering,” says Rowland.
10TV cameras captured some of the activity they’re concerned about.
There were transactions of some sort, going on in plain sight and feet away from where children played.
“We thought, well hey, what if we just went out and did something positive in the same place?” says Rowland. “And we called it positive loitering.”
Donte Woods grew up in East Columbus.
He says building connections is the start of building a stronger and safer neighborhood.
“Usually in neighborhoods like this, the rule is to stay away, stay quiet, don’t be too friendly because people can take advantage of that. But when you walk up to people’s houses and talk to them, they’re friendly people and they’re just like everybody else,” Woods said. “So something like this is really needed. It really is.”
First English Lutheran Church is also partnering with Columbus State Community College to compile statistics and map its neighborhood.
They hope it will help them more effectively target the blight, crime, and violence.
Watch 10TV News and refresh 10TV.com for more information. SOURCE
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